Unless you just happen to have been an expert in Voynichese for a decade or more, making sense of all the evidence and the theories (and even the people) surrounding it can be quite daunting. So I thought I’d help by drawing a map!
From my perspective, the general problem is that once you really latch onto a piece of evidence or a particular angle, you can easily become trapped inside it: and even though the solution you then reach may be entirely logical, it is almost always inconsistent with the other kinds of evidence and types of angle, and hence is almost always nonsensical.
I’d say this is precisely what happened with Gordon Rugg’s hoax theory, Jorge Stolfi’s East Asian language theory, and William Friedman’s artificial language theory – they all relied too heavily on one particular kind of evidence, and so arrived at untenable conclusions. But you will doubtless have your own thoughts on each of these. 🙂
It should also be clear that, like a kind of hummingbird theoretician, I’ve dotted around this diagram over the years, adding different ideas to the mix that try to explain different aspects of the evidence. I still believe that each of these suggestions will turn out to be largely correct, but the big trick will be finding a way – Intellectual History style – of making them all right at the same time!
http://www.invisiblegreen.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/06/20070620231625_hawk2.jpg
“Voynichese…” surely.
Careful there, Nick! Y’know wot I mean? “Please all – please none!” Keep on keeping on! I’m just 1 of your many fans. I sure have benefited from your efforts. World history (my junior year in high school) went right by my wondering eyes and listening ears because my history teacher spoke with stiff lips and throaty, gutteral accent. I still read lips and body language when conversing with others. I still can’t watch a stage play or opera. So, you and your friends are still the best thing going on on the WWW (note that double “on on”?)
Jes’ teasin yuh, as usual!
bd-id-1-dr
ps: One more book added to my research on Busbecq, Clusius, and Dodoens: “Osman’s Dream”, by Caroline Finkel
Nick & Co, do you know if anyone has overlaid an existing transcription on top of the scanned images available on the Beinecke library?
I’m thinking of a dataset consisting of [x, y, width, height] pixel values for each word (or even character) in each folio.
An enhanced EVA transcription, specifying word/character positions would open the door to a more in-depth automated analysis.
Job, Nick did an overlay of some very faint wording which appears on folio 116v (several months/year ago). Just recently Diane referred me to that item. I immediately recognized the words ancyranum, monumentum, Augustus. So, here I am today reading three books at the same time (cross-referencing like crazy) while posting my findings (with citations) here.
Two days ago, I discovered that Busbecg (Flemish) returned to Europe (Ferdinand I’s court, Vienna), and not long after, ended his diplomatic duties with Rudolph II, Prague, Bohemia. The point I am trying to make is that Busbecq wrote his diary/field notes in whatever script the Flemish used, BUT the words were Latin words. Busbecq was diplomatic representative to the Ottoman court for several years but was unable to avert Suleiman’s siege of Vienna.
Why Busbecq wrote about his visit to the Ancyranum Monument (Augustus) on the very last page of his diary, “beats me” (American slang for “I don’t know”). Perhaps he had intended to send it to the printers, and to have it bound in reverse order (?)
Whatever other speculations have been appearing on Nick’s pages, I haven’t seen a lot of “back-up” references/citations except on Diane’s and ThomS’s discussions; and zero/xero translations.
So, if code it is, I’ll leave those discussions to “you guys”.
Nick, you KNOW, by now, that I have great respect for you!
beady-eyed wonderr 🙂
Dear all, “B” are you and Diane referring to the very faint writing toward the bottom on f116v? About all my medium resolution monitor (14 inch) can make out is likely three short lines, lines 1 and 2 seemingly starting with the same word of three glyphs, “a “telephone gallows” o”. The rest is so faint as to be unintellible to my monitor and eyes. “B” if you have made this out into the three words relating to the temple of Augustus in Ankara, Turkey, there is nothing at all wrong with your vision!!! I cannot for the life of me get much more out of this except an old idea of a scribal pen nib trial? Has Nick or anyone else done a photo enhancement of this very faint writing. It appears Voynichy except what follows the first word in line 1 and 2, looks like a backward “9” or maybe a backward Latin “g” that might be a garden variety “p”?
Nick, after posting my comments of a few hours ago, I went back to “Turkish Letters” (paperback). Pages 38-41 are Busbecq’s discussion of Constantinople, wild beasts, dancing elephant (Busbecq refers to Seneca’s story of an elephant which walked a tightrope), and a cameleopard (of which Fr. Kircher later had engravings made),
Pages 39-40 (of Busbecq’s Turkish Letters) discuss Busbecg’s visits to Suleiman’s country estates “in charming valleys”. “What homes for the nymphs!” “What abodes of the muses!” There is more, but I’m now referring you to the Vms folios which display all of those naked women in the “creeks” or in the “bath-houses”.
My paperback copy of “The Turkish Letters of Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq” has confirmed my translations of those Vms folios which show the women processing through the baths. The fact that Busbecq called the women “nymphs” is very significant, because it validates my translation and identification of the various “temples”, “baths”, and “sacred groves” dedicated to Diana/Artemis.
Note that I haven’t yet referred to my earlier (several months ago on one of your other discussions) reference to the “Treaties of Nymphaea” (trade agreements between Venetians and/or Genoese) and the Turkish Empire.
At present, I’m looking at Erwin Panofsky’s assessment of the Vms, as offered in 1931-2 to Anne Nills (the Voynich secretary and companion), by comparison with two texts which have been constantly compared to the Vms in recent years: the ‘Lombardy Herbal’ and copies of ‘Balneis Puteolanis’ – the last said to have been written by Peter of Eboli, cleric and poet in the Sicilian court during the 12thC.
In the process, I’ve been a little surprised to discover that languages and peoples which our own formal histories suppose long vanished are very much alive in the memories and traditions of non-Europeans.
So, for example, a poet in 12thC Spain writes a third of one poem in Aramaic – which assumes not only he but his intended audience could still understand it.
Advice given by another Spaniard who removed to Caro because of religious persecution – refers as a well-known fact to Amorite origin for a particular practice – the Amorites supposed by our histories to be, by that time, extinct for more than two millennia. This reminds me that in the nineteenth century, playing cards were said to be ‘Median shields’ ‘Tars daylani’.
Obviously some of the terms may be metaphors, and I am *not* suggesting the Vms written in Amorite or Median.
But it does mean that we should check every assumption we make about the range of knowledge and languages known to non-Latins in the medieval centuries. It also means that the genuinely ancient imagery in some parts of the Vms may have been perfectly well understood, and consciously employed by some peoples even in the fifteenth century AD.
The map of nowhere. Still no one has shown any evidence.
Sergi: we have lots of evidence (though heavily fragmented) – we just have very few explanations that explain more than one or two pieces of evidence at a time. 🙂
Incidentally, I didn’t include [Dictionary Distribution] [Zipf’s Law] and [Gabriel Landini] in the diagram, but perhaps should… yet another independent strand of evidence! 😉
Neat trick Nick!
So basically, the day someone cracks this thing, whether it turns out to be a verbose cypher, an in-page transposition cypher or an “evolving cipher system” (lovely broad terms), you’re going to claim you had the idea first.
You’ve covered all the angles. Nice trick there.
But do you really claim to be the first to imagine that it could be any of the scenarios you claim?
Really, no one thought it could be a verbose cipher before you in 2003?
Really, no one thought the cypher system could evolve before you in 2012?
This is absolute BS…. like trying to trademark belief or atheism.
Goose: what is separating us here is the notion you seem to have that I am claiming this diagram is complete. It is not, and probably could never be.
Rather, the moralistic historical fable I’m trying to tell with a simple flow-charting tool is that I don’t believe that there is a single Royal Road to knowledge of the Voynich: and that the history of pursuing a small subset of evidence to its logical conclusion seems to lead instead to nonsensical or untenable outcomes.
As always with such diagrams, a lot has been lost fitting big ideas into small spaces. I can’t speak for other people, but perhaps it might help if I make my own ideas a little clearer.
In about 2003, I started proposing that the presence of verbose cipher might explain specific features of Voynichese, such as the VCVC-style structure of some labels (e.g. “otolal” in Pisces): others may well have suggested the same long before, but I couldn’t find it mentioned in d’Imperio or elsewhere, and nobody brought it up at the time. Please tell me if you have better information.
Similarly, the specific in-page transposition system I proposed was built upon the horizontal- and vertical-direction “key”-like strings noticed by Philip Neal, combining those with gallows characters in some way. I also dug up a passage in Alberti’s book on ciphers that briefly describes in-page transposition ciphers: again, if these had both been discussed earlier in the context of the Voynich Manuscript, please let me know.
And finally: I’m not referring to the “general” idea of an evolving cipher system, but to the very particular suggestion I made in 2012 that we should use the statistical evidence to try to search for specific structural matches between Currier “languages”. (e.g. I suspect that “ol-” in A may map to “l-” in B, etc). By doing this, I believe we may be able to normalize the text and get a little further beneath its skin. Once again, please let me know if this idea has been suggested much earlier.
Hope this helps make a very terse diagram much clearer!
Here’s an idea: include actual academic research in your graph, not just people with websites. For example Casanova. In the introduction we find:
“We discover that the manuscript takes on the qualities of a synthetic language whose alphabet —used
for its writing— would be subject to transformations”.
So there you go for the evolving cipher, taking into account languages A & B (and hybrids in between). That’s University of Paris VIII,1999.
Where is Casanova in your graph? Are you just discarding academic research entirely?
According to your graph, aside from you there have only been 7 people who have put forward theories… wow. Where is Jacques Guy in your graph? Where is Gabriel Landini? Have their publications in Cryptologia gone unnoticed?
I have followed your work for a while and admire your resolve, but this graph is really problematic on many levels. You leave out so much published, peer-reviewed research and make sweeping claims of invention (which you finally narrow down in your reply to me)… Sorry, but this reader is just not happy with what you’ve done there…
Goose: I said “what is separating us here is the notion you seem to have that I am claiming this diagram is complete. It is not, and probably could never be.”
My diagram clearly wasn’t supposed to depict a totality of theories, but rather a didactic selection of them visually coupled with their dependent relationship with the different types of statistical evidence.
As I am sure you know, Jacques Guy proposed the East Asian Voynich theory as a playful joke, and was kind of appalled when Jorge Stolfi took it seriously. So I have placed Stolfi next to the Exotic Languages category, which in turn is placed next to the linguistic similarities bubble.
Casanova does indeed talk about “mutations” between multiple artificial languages, while also concluding that this generally points towards abjad texts. As such, I think he is describing something more like a mutating artificial language, relying on the statistical evidence based around sectioning artefacts (Currier) and artificial language (Friedman)… so where should he go on the diagram?
Finally: criticising me for only referring to “people with websites” rings a little hollow on a web page that refers specifically to the work of Friedman, Tiltman, Currier, and Levitov, none of whom had a website.
I have read a lot of academic papers on the Voynich, but my honest opinion is that almost all of them misframe their questions in very basic ways. Few take a critical angle on either the history or the transcription: few seem to have read preceding work: few seem to look at anything but a single statistical angle. Is there a huge body of worthwhile Voynich analysis I am not aware of but should be citing?
Dear Goose,
I don’t know about you, but I think blogging’s better than journalism. We can give as we wish, and owe only the internet hosts.
And how’s yours going?
Goose,
There are no “Voynich experts”. We have people begining to make a name as historians of past (failed) efforts at decipherment.
There are people ‘expert’ in nothing but their own theory.
There are people expert at generating data from a transcription which mostly is not their own, and whose accuracy they rarely if ever question.
Then you get the small-area experts: in C-14 dating technques, in art analysis (e.g. Panofsky), in codicology (yet to be properly addressed) and in palaeography and epigraphy (most of the slog having been done by Nick.
Otherwise, men with a degree in making telescopes are pontificating about Persian baths, or with degrees in engineering trying to pronounce on imagery. That’s how it goes.
There is no possibility of genuine peer review here, and as anyone knows who reads academic articles in their own non-Voynich speciality.. well, let’s say kindly that not every published paper is a revelation.
The internet was established to allow rapid international exchange between scholars. I think it’s still doing that – surprisingly often in blogs.
Hello everyone!
I think the Nick’s idea is very good, represent all existing theories. But I agree with Goose also: this graph should not remain at the stage of draft.
Ruby
Ruby: actually, I was trying more to map the -kinds- of statistical evidence typically used, and the -kinds- of theories specifically built upon those first kinds of evidence.
Also: as the example of Antoine Casanova shows, where theories and ideas are based on multiple types of evidence, it can be hard to map them neatly.
It is possible that it would be more effective to draw the same diagram inside out (i.e. with the theorists in the middle and the evidence on the outside). Some people may prefer this: but personally, I’d rather place the Voynich at the middle! 😉
Nick, you keep the “Voynich” smack-dab in the middle, y’hear! I’m still rotating through three books of Turkish & Busbecq history. What is making me crazier than “usual” is that I can’t re-locate a reference made in re Busbecq’s observation of people on the streets stopping in mid-stride to pick up a scrap of paper and stuffing it into a crack in a wall. Ottomans deemed paper to be sacred to Mohammed — was the explanation Busbecq was given.
So, we now may have an explanation as to why an entire travel “diary” was written on animal skins supplied to Busbecq by his Ottoman hosts, rather than paper.
I’m planning on returning to Leiden University’s Clusius and Busbecq correspondence to research the medium upon which they each wrote.
Diane:
“Otherwise, men with a degree in making telescopes are pontificating about Persian baths, or with degrees in engineering trying to pronounce on imagery. That’s how it goes.”
That is absolutely priceless and beautifully put. It is also why I quit my PhD after the first year.
Please can this be adopted as a site motto and prominently displayed, so that we can all pause for thought before expatiating on something about which, on reflection, we may conclude we know relatively little and understand less?
Sir Hubert,
I meant only that all of us, including me, have to work beyond formal competencies. What saddens me is an apparent absence from Voynich studies of that dispassion (apatheia) which is normally considered essential in research, whether in the critical sciences or the pragmatic.
Which is why, contrary to the present customs, I refuse to frame hypotheses in advance of investigating evidence. A friend teased me the other day, saying that the Sherlock Holmes approach had been superseded by post-post-modernism, and why didn’t I know that? I do.
😀
ThomS and all,
When I am once again directing your attention to folio 116v, I am referring to the top two lines next to the “nekkid lady” and the goat/sheep which stimulated some discussion between the three of us (you, Diane, and me) not too long ago as to whether that animal was a fat-tail sheep or an angora goat.
Previous to that discussion, I had asked Diane for the blog reference to “nihil obstat”, and she referred me to folio 116v, and Nick’s attempt to translate that first set of lines. As far as I’ve been able to determine, Nick’s attempt had no response from anyone until I “opened the door”, so to speak, with my word for word translation of those two lines which referred to Ancyranum Monumentum Augustus — which in turn refers to what were the ruins of a temple/monument to the Roman emperor) near Ankara.
Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq, in his printed “Turkish Letters” discusses the monument, and its largely ruined engraved writing on all of its walls, in depth.
In this, our most recent century, archaelogical work and repairs are ongoing. A fascinating website will give you glimpses of the actual structure and repair and or/replacement of the engraved stones.
So, whoever wrote the “Voynich” (I’m positive it was Busbecq) was writing about “everything” which didn’t impinge on his diplomatic correspondence and responsibilities.
As an aside, but may be very relevant, is that Busbecq apparently returned to Europe, for the last time, with a menagerie which was gifted to Rudolph II. I’m still reading and checking my references for this last item. So, if you’re interested, I’m pretty sure you’ll dig up the info. 🙂
bdid1dr, i was looking for something along the lines of http://voynich.freie-literatur.de/index.php?show=extractor, but enhanced with the pixel area corresponding to each word.
I’ve started extracting this data for myself which i believe will be of great use as it will provide a strong connection between the original text and the corresponding transcription.
I’ve sensed that the available transcriptions are often interpreted as being unreliable. This may in fact be the case – and this type of data will help identify the extent to which that is true – but it should also not be a deterrent to transcription-based cipher analysis.
A spatial index of the words in the VMS will allow researchers to collect fragments from the original text and display them side-by-side with no effort.
How much more effective will an argument be if you can back it up with evidence from the original text? That is what i’m hoping for.
The Voynich manuscript thus far does not satisfy all of the above, and I don’t suspect it will. For one thing, it is a real language, so that eliminates Gordon Rugg’s hoax theory, as well as William Friedman’s artificial language theory. I am not sure what Leo Levitov’s polyglot language theory entails, but if he supposed the Voynich was made of more than one language, he would be wrong, in the strict sense of the interpreted meaning. However, if he meant the language was similar to others and had both defined, and unrecognized sister languages to compare against, then that is true. Jorge Stolfi’s suggestion of an exotic language is not true unless you assume the particular method of delivery to be the exotic part…and even that may be a stretch. The delivery method is however different than the language’s current delivery method…but not more than one would expect for it being old text. As for the cipher system, there is a definite, predictable system, in fact, there are two, intertwined. It repeats over and over, and is very clever for the time, but probably wouldn’t look that clever if you saw it in your native tongue in current dialogue. I guess that keeps John Tiltman’s theory in the running(assuming the title explains the theory, as I have not read his theory). It is not in abbreviated shorthand either, so that eliminates Mark Perahk’s theory based on the above. Further, the work is highly likely a copy of a much older manuscript. None of the translated text thus far goes past around 800 AD…with the exception of one section added by someone else which states their year, their theories, and what changes they made to the book. In fact there is a very interesting reference to an event in 536 AD. The event is the cataclysmic volcano eruption. The text (put into Modern English grammatical Format for readability) reads as such: during the extreme winter (probable name) (conducted) a spell of youth. (Probable name) desired xxx(encoded word) spell of youth, golden drink of (name, omitted to preserve my method). Golden youth of drunken witch ( alt might say honorable opinion, but the letter variance is only off by one for the former, compared to 3 for the latter) of (name omitted, same name as above). Golden youth, drink of (name omitted, same as above). The mist grew dark for a fortnight, (like a) horrific dream ( literal translation is desire or wish). ( from here follows six words I do not have completed yet. One is encoded, one has ambiguous letters, three are translated, and one is likely a name. Of these, the last two are translated as “deceptive gleam”, and might go into the next bit, referencing the failure of the next two words). Great drink. Not many youth made ( it. (Aka survived)). From their song from their “place name’s” ( name known, but I am omitting it) account, poisonous venom darkened the breeze. During that time, many were buried. Of the remaining, 39 ( I am not yet certain which number system is being used, if it was a different one this number might as high as 67) recovered, but 29 who drank still died. ( this number is likely 20 something, could be 29, or 27). The story remains at a place ( omitted) telling of the drink’s deeds.
There is more, but I have not completed translations past that point on this particular page.
Mindy: the kind of thing you’re talking about is not really anywhere on that chart…
Nick, well I am not sure where to go with that comment. Perhaps I should give some of the identified plants? Thus far, the plants are (or were) all real. My son inadvertently helped me discover the first one, which is not labeled. Not all of them are labeled. The plants in the front section do not seem to be labeled on any front pages yet. However, at least one thus far is labeled in the later section, with roots. The first plant I identified was the draconia cinnabarra. This tree is native to socotra…so, now you can see the plants are not limited to the European continent. The text on the page speaks of a princess who died, and where she was buried, under a number (possibly 7 or maybe 5) of mountains, below a cave. My theory is the mountains might be in socotra (ergo the plant reference) which might indicate the hajir (sp?) mountains.
Some others which have been identified likely were ingredients for drinks. One page references banana root, orange root, and some relative of morning glory, among others. And of course there is the mandrake, which curiously, is on a page labeling other roots, but where the mandrake is not labeled. I suppose that is because mandrake is so easy to identify. That would also explain why the carrot is also not labeled (same row). However, I have not translated that page yet, only looked at it a little. One problem I have been running into has been finding labeled plants with unknown names. In these cases I believe the names were lost to history due to social changes.
Dear Mindy
The way people usually offer their identifications – at least since the 1960s, is to specify the folio along with posited identification and if possible – though it’s not easy – also saying whether agreeing with earlier suggestions or making a new one.
For example, some years ago I identified the subject of f.25v as Dracaeba cinnabari (the Soqotran plant). In some older sources, the same plant is called D. cinnabaris.
Thanks to the other researchers kindness, I learned that this identification almost agreed with earlier proposed identifications as Dracaena draco, the western dragonsblood tree, Dracaena draco).
These days, I think we are probably both right, but for that folio I still think D. cinnabaris is the focal species.
It would be nice to know that others agree – but you don’t say which folio you mean.
Hi Diane, yes correct folio. Sorry I am a newcomer. I do things my own way. I have only been looking at the manuscript since may of this year. One reason I have not posted the folios is because the decoding comes very easily for me, and I am not yet really ready give up the method because it is repeatable, validatable, and once given up can be completed by pretty much anyone who wants to do so. That said, I am therefore wary of giving pages from which someone else could glean the answers first, since I have only had a short time to work on it and do not have anywhere near all pages translated. The best way to get the answers would probably be to take the book to a university full of bored college students, and give them the method. I figure the whole book could be translated in a matter of days in the way. Alternately, someone computer savvy could create a program for the code, and then maybe the book could be done electronically ( although I hear the way Google translate works is by using previously translated materials… so it would have to be a non Google translate method). Here are some other facts I will put out however. 1 the manuscript is not in Italian. I just want to make that clear because of the number of people who assume it is some sort of Italian anagram a La Dan Brown style. 2 however, interestingly, there is an amount of artwork completed around the time the other writer (mentioned below) wrote their date in the book, which is somewhat Dan Brown-esque in referencing material in the book . By the way, I forgot, the other writer coded differently. Also, the other writer’s date was 1500 exactly. The other writer also mentioned another date, 1050. However, even though the date 1050 is mentioned, I have not run into the story the other writer mentioned yet ( which by the way is historically accurate within a few years of error). The story with the closest date to our time I have translated is from approximately AD 800s, or possibly 900s depending on what site I source. Some stories have been BC, one was around 398-402, and a few have been between 500 and 600AD.
Dear Mindy (& Diane)
Please visit Voynich folio 83v, which very first word translates to the Latin word bal-near-ius-am-eus/bath-house). Those strange, globular objects are not named or labeled. However, the fruit of the mandrake is being discussed as both a sedative (its diluted juice) and as a relaxant/pain reliever.
Several months ago, I discussed this same folio at length on one of Nick’s other pages. I also referred you all to a website which apparently is still being maintained (host is now deceased) which discusses various solanacea (and their uses/misuse): The Ambrosia Society
I’m still hoping Nick and Diane will follow-up on my discussions, and see for themselves. I’m sure you, also, will find some answers as to why there isn’t a “mandrake” plant featured in any of the “Voynich” botanical, pharma, or recipe dialogues.
Dear B,
I interpret the imagery on f.83v as reference to certain seasonal phenomena – apprently not your way of seeing it. As regards translations or decipherments for the written text – not my area.
bdid1dr, I am sorry to inform you, but although the page does have to do with water, the first word does not mean “bath house”. And, again, it’s not in Latin. First glance, it looks like the name of a King or (more likely given pictorial content) Queen. I have not translated this page. I was going to give it to a friend of mine, since she wanted to know what these pages meant. However, I will now take a look at it. I do not see the word “Mandrake” anywhere on the page. Of note, one of the pump things appears to say “water spirit” (spelling has changed a bit from then to now). Further, the green pump upper middle, left side, has a label which translates to “anoint each (person) well” (spelling has not changed much).
Oh, I forgot to mention…the mandrake is on folio 101r, bottom middle.
For clarification about folio 101r… Mandrake = bottom, more to the right, but there is one other plant to its right which appears cut off. It’s the one with the face.
Dear all, particularly “B”, What I was straining to see on f115v turns out, I think, to be bleedthrough of text from the previous page. Why it shows up here when I found no other example of text bleed through in the VM, is a mystery; maybe a very thin folio? Has the last folio been scraped? Nearly every folio of the botanical section has bleed through going both ways and Nick has expounded on this in his book (e.g. p66) and elsewhere. Incidentally another case of transfer from one folio sheet to another is on f43r where traces of f42v can be seen in addition to f43v. What is puzzling to me is bleed through from back to front and the reverse of folio sheets varies from pretty much roughly equivalent to somewhat asymmetric. It seems that more equivalent bleed through occurs near the start (e.g. f2-22) of the botanicals and then gets spottier and more asymmetric as the folio numbers increase as though the colorists were using color more sparingly or are we looking at thicker vellum? Using a micrometer on each vellum sheet, as has been suggested earlier, would provide some useful data. Maybe asymmetrical bleed through could related to hide side or inside of the vellum? Nick has likely already been there and considered that in his quire numbering arguments?
Dear all, Oops, I meant f116v, the last page of the VM that received “B”s decrypt. The transfer would have been from f116r. What led me to the view that it is just a bleed though is that elsewhere on that same last page, can be detected very faint glyphs. It cannot be argued convincingly that the reason bleedthough is seen here is because the rest of the folio is blank. A large number of instances arise in the botanical section where blank space on one recto folio, for example, overlays a written on verso section. If f116v were scraped, maybe removing a colophon(?), the original might be spotted with UV photography, in the manner that the Archimedes palimpsest was spotted?.Voynich must have done that as the two lines in Latin/German at the top of f116v do not form a typical colophon as the writing hand differs from the two VM scribes. Did Kraus look at it or Yale for that matter? Seems a not unimportant point!
Thomas: it might well be that the final page was thinned by a combination of handling wear and handling contamination (oils off hands, etc), making it more see-through than you might otherwise expect.
Mindy,
I reiterate that you are not going to find the words “mandrake fruit” anywhere on Vms folio 83v. You are only going to find discussion for the fruit juice being used as a mild sedative (diluted juice), or (maybe) full mandrake fruit juice being used for anesthesia during childbirth. Those “maraca-shaped rattles” are not pumps. Nor are they witch-doctor rattles. They are the FRUIT of the mandrake plant (the blossom head still attached for ease of identification).
Diane & Mindy, the bath-house to which I am referring has several different names, “nymphaeum” being one. Busbecg almost goes into rhapsodies (in his “Letters” about Suleiman’s country estates), their pastoral beauty, and the health benefits for Suleiman’s ‘nymphs’.
By the way, anyone is free to express one’s own opinion or viewpoint on Nick’s discussion pages. However, I don’t think it is polite to engage in argumentation or contradiction of another’s posts.
Nick, is it possible that the nearly illegible writing at bottom of folio 116v may have been a form of colophon, or directions for how the entire manuscript was to be reproduced with Gutenberg’s invention? Or maybe simply the writer’s sign-off phraseology (sincerely yours, your faithful servant…….
🙂
To Mindy Dunn, Do you mean to imply that the VM is written in something akin to English? Latin is ruled out?
To Sir Hubert, Maybe Diane’s observation has some relevance but maybe not in any perjorative or demeaning sense. I think it is possible that many Voynich investigators bring something useful to the quest, even if it is totally outside of his or her area of expertise. Just a training in logical thinking and the ability to plan experiments is, to my way of thinking, the most useful of skills. Can come from anywhere or any discipline. Botany, Pharmacology,an IT background, art history training, history, astronomy and linguistics likely will be the most useful but someone might come in from left field with a game changer! I sort of doubt that it will be alchemy but who knows?
Thomas,
That’s well said. Problems only arise when people begin talking about ‘peer review’. It would presumptious for someone from my area to claim an ability to evaluate efforts at deciphering, just as for a person whose expertise is in IT or linguistics to claim they could ‘peer review’ my work.
However, the cross-disciplinary approach is just what’s needed, as Nick himself argued here when he began the blog.
Hello Thomas Spande, I like your question. I mean that the text is neither in Latin nor in Italian. There IS a segment written in non vonichese (the segment which references the date of 1500), and I have translated this as well, but this segment is also not in Latin or Italian. As a matter of fact, the Voynich speakers did not seem to like Rome very much, as they repeatedly coded the words Rome and Roman (always in the same manner). Also, please note, until I have decided to state what the language is, I will continue to refer to it as Voynichese.
I put the words that I translated into a modern English style for ease of readership. This is because the grammar is not in English style. However, it is in much the same style of the language as it exists today (minus the coding bit). As to whether or not it is English, the answer as I’m sure you’ve already guessed is no.
Now another tidbit. The first page contains a story which I do NOT want to release right away. My theory is the non-voynich speakers who had the copy we have today released some of the data as they were translating it. Because of that, copious amounts of knowledge were subverted and hidden by a powerful nation once the story was released. Now, EITHER there was a second copy in a completely separate country (Germany, now you know it’s not in German either), OR Germany heard of the release of information. Four years prior to the 1500 date, and 9 years after, two separate artists created depictions of the scene described in the first page. The artists are Albrecht Durer and Lucas Cranach. (Now you can have a little fun figuring out their similar work, which shouldn’t be too hard).
Of the other stories in the book which I have translated, two are incredibly famous. One, I’ve never heard of. Two are currently categorized as mythology. One I have described below. One is the codex.
One thing I have done is gone through the book and decided based on key words which pages I want to decode. For example, I can look for the word King or Queen, and find pages to decode on kings and queens based solely on the word (not on seeing a crown). This is useful because for example pages 1V, 2R, and 5R, (in addition to the aforementioned 25v, and 83v) all talk about various royal persons. I also know where to start on the circle pages. I didn’t when I translated the “OTOLAL” page. I started at a point I thought was logical, but it was the wrong spot. This became apparent after I had translated a lot of the circle, and came to the translation “under verse”, meaning to go to the next circle inward. I also know that on the Otolal page the pictures pretty much exactly match the text, location wise. For example, the woman emerging, with blood, is next to a word that translates as “emergency”, indicating she miscarried. I also know who this woman was, but I shall omit her name for the time being.
It does still take a while to translate, because I’m not a native speaker. However, I don’t think it takes anywhere near the same amount of time it would take someone to decode the whole thing in anagram. This of course is because I have the advantage of word recognition.
One thing I find HIGHLY intriguing is the fact this book made it to Rome (the center of christian doctrine) AND was NOT destroyed, even though during the middle ages there was a heavy inquisition in play. (The book may or may not be christian in its entirety, but at least one page references a “head abbey”). Thankfully, it made it to Rome about a century or so after the initial damage from the book was likely done. Also, thankfully, the book was not in latin or Italian. Also, thankfully, the book has a trove of features which make it so desireable. For example, on page 85v, the 4 people holding artifacts, one of which looks to be a christian relic of some sort, perhaps a chalice. Or on the map page, with its ever so evident X marks the spot….or the mythical creatures, or perhaps it was just the naked ladies…whatever the reason, there is enough intrigue to the book to have spared the book. And, without knowing how to read it…well, it retains its mystery.
Mindy
One thing puzzles me. You claim to agree with my identification for fol.25v, which is nice.
Apart from that, you seem to want to share your results ~ which is great ~ but at the same time you won’t say what language/s you think are used, or anything else much.
If you want to keep it all secret until you publish, that’s fine. Other notable figures share nothing substantial online.
But if you want to make a public claim that you can understand the written text, then it would be a good idea to inicate the basics: like language/s or what type of cipher method, or even what type of script you think it is.
Your mentioning Soqotra I found interesting. There the local language is Mahri, but for the earlier medieval period we have Greek and New Persian among the languages spoken there. Possibly also Syriac and one or more Indian languages since it was a centre of the international trade.
Inscribed items that were found in a Soqotran cave a few years ago went to an Indian specialist, which suggests Indian script and/or languages. He may have published something about them since, though I haven’t followed it up recently.
Speaking in purely graphic terms, I’ve always thought the script resembled a kind of wobbly Greek, written in a script close to Sabaean miniscule – but as I say that’s purely the look of the thing, not related to linguistics.
Mindy, as things are, your ideas are interesting but read a bit like the ‘South Sea Bubble’, about which no-one was allowed to know anything.
Diane, I had never heard of the south sea bubble until I looked at your post. I guess you are referring to the 18th century british speculation in the south seas? Anyway, you are right, I really do want to share…but there are things about the manuscript which make me hesitate (historical accounts which could still bear weight today). And, since I don’t have the whole thing translated yet…am I even allowed to announce that I have the answer? Of course I do have the answer…but shouldn’t I wait till I’m done decoding? I’ve never announced an answer for a cipher before. So, what do I do? If it’s as easy as saying, “I, Mindy Dunn have the answer to how to decrypt the Voynich Manuscript.” Then, there you go. But I am assuming there is more to it than that. Alternately, I guess I could give anyone of you the same information I had, and you could all try it. I formerly imagined I would translate, then give the information to a native speaker, and ask them for input.
By the way, I’m using a pocket dictionary…supplemented with the internet for words not in the pocket dictionary.
Mindy,
I’ve never announced an answer for a cipher before.
On this site you’ve already announced solutions to the Dorabella and Ohio ciphers. 🙂
There are many people claiming to have deciphered portions of the VMS – and resolutely sticking to their claim.
Unless you are using a very mechanical and straightforward decoding process, announcing a solution would only be the first step in actually convincing people that it is correct.
For example, a decoding procedure resembling your suggested Ohio cipher solution – in which the author would have randomly encoded words – would have a tough time with the critics because it leaves too much room for interpretation.
But i didn’t get anywhere with the Ohio cipher either, so good luck with this one.
Mindy.
I’m speaking as an outsider here, but my understanding is that as soon as someone thinks they have a possible *method* they share it, to allow their ideas to be tested independently by others well-qualified to conduct such tests.
As Nick said a while ago there have been so many ‘translations’ announced as fait accompli that scarcely any notice is paid them any more. But if you can explain the system, and nominate the language, you’d still have dibs on copyright, I should think and the more people accept your results, the more likely they are to buy copies of any book you publish. I guess. Otherwise, if your decipering-method and final translation can’t be number-crunched independently, your translation is likely to go the way of the others – the Czech gamatria translation, the Arabic translation (so far); Don Hoffmann’s Latin translation (so far); Bd’s latin translation hasn’t been checked against Don’s, but if they agree, then the Latin star might be on the rise.
I understand that another(?) Latin translation might have been proposed or offered by Edith Sherwood.
I rather think people are sticking to Latin not because Latin stats agree with Voynich stats, so much as that they have a theory into which Latin fits better and easier than other languages. Who wants to struggle with minor or lost languages current in the 15thC?
Diane and Thomas:
Diane’s remark struck a particular chord with me regarding comparative methods in history. I found it depressing when experts with years of experience in field A read a couple of articles about field B and thought this was sufficient for them to compare the two meaningfully. What is needed, of course, is for two experts in fields A and B to discuss common areas – Diane’s interdisciplinary approach.
I agree entirely that logical thinking and a methodological approach are hugely important. Michael Ventris was an architect, not a philologian. Unfortunately, one of the biggest problems here is sticking to the tussocks of solid data without sinking into the treacherous bog of speculation. Otherwise, it’s far too easy to construct a hypothesis which is logically consistent and well-argued but, unfortunately, groundless.
Personally, I think that for the Voynich MS we’re reaching the limits of what intelligent, talented amateurs can do with the material available. So, to untangle Diane’s splendid image, I’d rather see art historians/analysts interpreting the imagery, engineers guiding us on engineering, and historians of science advising on telescopes. I’ve never knowingly met an expert on Persian baths, although I rather wish I had.
How can one be a Voynich expert when we still know so little about what the Voynich is?
Oh well, here we all go; down another rabbit hole.
🙂
I asked my husband if I should put the method on here. He emphatically said no, not yet. So, I will still refrain. However, i will give you the translation to the last page.
By the way, I went back and did the addition on a calculator, and I apparently can’t add in my head very well…so the number is not 1500…it’s actually at least 100 years later (1600), even if assuming the 90 went to the 1050, thus making the 1050 into 1140. However, if assuming the 90 went to the 1600, that means it would have been 1690. So I apologize for the misinformation in the earlier post.
Back on topic…I have read the last page has been assumed by some to be a codex. Its not a codex. However, it does verify something Nick Pelling noticed a while back (the similarity between the last page handwriting and the label writing). Oh, and I guess, since it’s the only place I’ve encountered anything resembling shorthand, it could put Mark Perahk’s theory back in for a few words.
The first line, put in modern letters, reads: Poxlaban Roman notatao/notafaon (I am not 100% sure of the exact spelling of #3, a close spelling in portuguese = notação, which might be what the letters are) The meaning is probably “Potion/portion/portuguese? labels in roman notations.” This is why there are a bunch of labels all throughout the book in a similar handwriting to the work on the last page. It also verifies Nick Pelling’s connection between the hidden words in the plants and the letter similarities on the last page.
One thing I haven’t figured out yet is why the writers decided to add the labels. I currently favor the Portuguese having written this portion, because it would explain certain aspects of portugese exploration. One example is their exploration and controlling of Socotra (Soqotra). However, considering the date is now much later than I had previously been assuming, these notations could have been written by an entirely different nation.
I have two theories as to why the labels were added. 1- They were unable to translate the whole thing, so they made markings on particular pages as to what they thought. 2-The were able to translate the whole thing and the markings indicate which pages to visit next (or some other useful thing). If #2 is true, it could explain why the book is not in a chronological order, and why folio 25v ends with “the end”. However, considering particular historical events, I favor the former theory, which might have explained certain erroneous beliefs when explorers started looking for mythical items.
Moving to the next line. First word is gone…but that’s okay.
We start with + Americon (american) oladabad (modern word is likely a variation of alaban) + MLcqb (ML and shorthand for começa). This would read: American wanderings 1050 commenced (a better translation-Exploration in America commenced around 1050).
As I look again at the xc forming 90, it occurs to me, it is possible it is – c, which could indicate 940.
According to a variety of sources, the new world became widely known as America in the early 1500s, and was first used on a map in 1507.
Back to the words: the next part represents an addition of years to the next date. Next words: + XC +CCCV + CCVC + nsovtach + M. This means: 90+305+295+ (I believe this word means something like “en suite” or “which brings us to”, or “becomes”, or “with the addition of”…you get the idea)+ 1000=1690…or, if the 90 goes above, 1600. (This is the number I formerly believed to be 1500 because of my apparently ridiculously poor math skills).
The next part puts the guesses by the author of the origination language. These are: Pix (Pictish), Manqx (Manx), Moiinxt (I didn’t figure this one out), Vix (probably viking), Aria (Aran); Mathina (I didn’t figure this one out), anon (one) thig (comes) Valbsh (Welsh) Ubvey (I didn’t figure this one out) fo mim (or likewise) Galmich (gaelic).
There is a bit more that I could say about the page, but I will refrain for the time being, as I have just completed the last word (galmich). So…I do apologize again for the 1500 error…hopefully this information is useful to you all. There are a lot of clues in here now.
OH, and as an aside…Bdid1dr (Bea/B. did wonder? nice 🙂 ): I went back to page 83v last night and took a second look at the first word. It still isn’t “bath house”…BUT after searching for a while for an ancient royal under the name it should have been, I realized I must be looking for the wrong thing. Almost immediately I found an alternate translation which you will like. “Pool Terrace”.
Mindy (and Diane) my “Nick”-name for Nick’s various discussion pages translates to “beady-eyed wonder”. Sometimes I stick on
extra “r” so that I’m sometimes a beady-eyed wonderer.
Back on topic, somewhat: Have any of you been at all curious about some of the other members of Ferdinand I’s diplomatic corps to Suleiman’s empire? I’ve just finished running down a couple of leads to an artist who was “along for the trip”: Melchior Lorck
Fascinating!
Mindy: Please define “last page” of “(manuscript name)” and/or “folio number” of either the commonly-used name “Voynich” OR, better yet, the Boenicke Library manuscript number (408). Referencing is tedious, I know, but is very necessary if one is to make sense of your donations to these pages. Thanx! I am a retired records management specialist/paralegal for a large city’s Clerks office and for the same city’s Attorney’s office. Before the “birth’ of the computer age and the WorldWideWeb, my index and cross-files numbered some 300,000 entries. I was instrumental in getting my employers up-to-date with laser technology and “word-in-text’ recognition computer technology(pre-Google).
I sense that you are considerably younger than me (I’ll be 70 in September). I mention this only because I do somewhat envy your nearly-instantaneous access to all of the historical resources, of which many were still “hide-bound” in various University archives and not available to the “public at large”.
Boy, am I having a ball! (Hey, guys, this is an “ancient” expression for having a good time! Don’t you dare leer at me!) 😉
SirHubert: you ask “How can one be a Voynich expert when we still know so little about what the Voynich is?”
“what the Voynich is” is the end-result of the whole process – until then, the only question that actually needs answering is “what happened?”
Beady eyed wonder, the folio is 116v. By the way, yes I am younger than you. Apparently I am half your age. Look, my point was never to snub you. I just wanted to tell people the answer, because I know it. At the same time I feel a need to protect it. Therefore I won’t always give the folios. Sometimes I purposely omit them. However, in this case I was just negligent. I made an assumption the folio wouldn’t be necessary, since it is the last encoded page.
On another note, Job, for some reason I didn’t see your comment until today. So, yes I did the dorabella…but then I decided there were a couple notes that were ambiguous…so I pulled back for revision… plus I finally found the other Elgar pieces, which I saw reference for but was unable to find at first…so I am trying to check them against each other.
And oh yeah, I forgot about the ohio….that was just for fun. Actually, my initial thought was I should build some sort of credibility by doing the other ones first… but maybe that isn’t necessary.
Hmmm and as for validation of the voynich method I have, I will offer this. If someone wants to check my work, then please let me know. I will need a way to send the data. Easiest is email I guess. Then I will send a tailored encrypted decode key for you.
Sir Hubert,
To an extent we do have a sieve.
The parchment dates the ms to not later than 1438.
– all stories about the Americas are out, as are ideas about 16th or 17thC characters having made it.
The parchment is almost, but not perfectly equalised.
– this puts out regions where parchment is perfectly equalised. In this ‘out’ group then are German-Latin hypotheses, since latin-German manuscripts of the time were on perfectly equalised parchment, as they had been from the late 13thC. Minority groups, or works produced after various social upheavals do produce exceptions.
The ink is a red-brown colour, not black.
– this makes a mainstream Latin-Italian provenance less likely (cf. the Lombardy Herbal MS Sloane 4106 as typical of mainstream Latin cullture in c.1440).
After nearly 600 years, the ink shows little (I’ve not seen any) sign of causing corrosion. This means low levels of iron salts in the ink.
So each indication given by the physical object allows some hypotheses abut manufacture to be discounted.
The manuscript is plainly a compendium/miscellany whose exemplars might, theorietically, have come from anywhere but which cannot have been later than c.1438.
— so there go hypotheses about the Latin-Portuguese presence in the eastern seas or in the Americas.
As to those exemplars, Panovsky’s first assessment attributed the work to a southern, and probably Spanish, Jewish origin. He originally suggested the 13thC or 14thC (obviously, for the exemplars, though he assumed authorship would be contemporary with manufacture). He altered that date only by reference to the pigments (which in any case we think late addition), and the manuscript’s ‘shapely ladies’. But since then some works from exactly his posited milieu (14thC Spanish, Jewish) have come to notice in which females are drawn just so.
Again, this is a step in tracing the sources (and possibly the language and/or script), not the end point.
Also, I think Panovsky paid too little attention to evidence that several disparate sources contribute to the Vms’ sections, and myself I think that only some came from the south, others coming by other means from regions to the east.
Still, the object itself sets a perimeter outside which we can distinguish fairly easily the plausible from implausible speculation and hypothesis.
-imo-
Diane, would you please explain “equalized” as your discussion refers to “parchment”? I’ve mentioned b4 that unused manuscript material could be stored for years b4 being used.
As far as the inks and paints which were used, I guess we have to leave that discussion to the “experts” as far as whether metal (iron gall/copper) or insect (wasp gall) or plant material (pomegranate juice) was being used.
It’s nice that you are bringing Mindy up to date — even if some of your discussions/references/documentations have been outdated by more recent historians/experts/non-Victorian University professionals – and the latest-but-not-necessarily-greatest analytic methods.
Then we have professionals like Zahi Hawass who eventually are overwhelmed by the politics and power-hungry militants who really don’t give a damn about “history”.
History is still “what goes around, comes around, and bites you in the butt”. Eh?
Diane, would you please explain “equalized” as your discussion refers to “parchment”?
– Equalised parchment is so well prepared that what was the hair-side can be distinguished from the flesh-side only with the closes attention.
I’ve mentioned b4 that unused manuscript material could be stored for years b4 being used.
– Yes, you and Rich Santacoloma both.
As far as the inks and paints which were used, I guess we have to leave that discussion to the “experts”
– McCrone’s is considered expert.
It’s nice that you are bringing Mindy up to date — even if some of your discussions/references/documentations have been outdated by more recent historians/experts/non-Victorian University professionals – and the latest-but-not-necessarily-greatest analytic methods.
– I gather this is just an effort to say my references are outmoded, without actually saying where, when, how or why.
.. professionals like Zahi Hawass who eventually are overwhelmed by the politics and power-hungry militants who really don’t give a damn about “history”.
– To speak generally: Not giving a damn about history goes hand in hand with feeling too attached to some hypothesis. I think its a particularly obnoxious disease, which can affect critical as well as pragmatic sciences. In extreme cases it leads to situations where scientific evidence is faked, and documentary evidence – or the person presenting that evidence are actually or metaphorically burned. Not too common among professionals, but not unknown.
History is still “what goes around, comes around, and bites you in the butt”. Eh?
– No, it’s “stuff that happened” -including ideas which chronically sweep regions, dominating them as effectively as any army or plague.
Finding out ‘what happened’ requires more slog than hypothesising. But in the end you can only hope that your secondary sources are sound, and that the random mix of surviving evidence presents a fair cross-section.
In future B, could you put one question at a time? Makes reading both Q and A less tiresome for everyone, I think.
By the way, Busbecq’s physician (Quackquelben) while in the Ottoman territories, names a particular plant ‘scordium’ as a cure for plague. I looked up the reference and found Dioscorea. So, for those of you are are really fixated on the botanical offerings of the Vms/Boenicke 408, look for a vine which roots are exaggerated/emphasized, and which name seems to be referring to Dioscorides. A more common name for the plant’s tubers, even today, is “yam”. So, if you do find discussion referring to Dioscorides, and maybe a very short word formed by the “Voynich” letters as “eam”, you will then understand that EVA isn’t going to help you in your “decoding” or translation. Sorry!
Diane & other interested parties: Do visit Leyden Univerity’s tremendous (but easily accessed) photo-files of the correspondence of Busbecq and Clusius — not just between themselves but also each gentleman’s correspondence with the “rest” of Europe. Busbecq, at least, wrote in the lanquage of the recipient of his letters. I’m not sure about Clusius’ records, although I got the impression that he may have been wordier when responding to his many “admirer’s”, who apparently were begging him for tulip bulbs.
After reading a paperback edition of “The Turkish Letters of Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq” (Forster/Roider) issued by Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, I have finally realized that my contributions to any discussion pertaining to the “Voynich” manuscript are going to be buried as quickly as possible by some of your devoted fans.
Just so you know, Nick, I have traced the manuscript’s origin and its purpose: to inform and educate; to entertain; and maybe, to get verification from his last bosses (Ferdinand I and Rudolph II) as to which animals were to be shipped to which court (Vienna or Prague).
None of the contents of the “Voynich” manuscript were “secret” — nor is there one word of secret code. Many of the place names are recognizable if one takes the trouble to read their pre-sixteenth century maybe “Crimean Gothic” spelling and lettering/ciphers. I stand firm in my belief that Rudolph II was the last “boss” of Busbecq. I also believe that Rudolph was the involuntary recipient of the zoo animals which Suleiman had given Busbecq before his return to Europe.
Oh for pete’s sake…i have half a mind to just post the language and alphabet system. first of all, if you want to get anywhere you have to know how many letters there are. Of course the most likely page to start is the codex, the real one. Then you know how many letters. From there, go look at ancient alphabet systems. Compare and contrast them…hopefully you will be able to figure out all but three letters in the first week and a half. then, the last three are easy enough enough once you look at the info and make some educated guesses. Voila, alphabet system no one else in the world has, which translates directly, every time. Now you only have two more things to figure out…the two ways the words are coded, and the language. For the language, focus on the first and second words of the manuscript and you will have your answer.
Wal, Mindy, literal-mindedness will take you only so far. I’ve noticed a tendency, with various of our highly-educated “codiologists”, to stubbornly cling to the idea that the “Voynich” is written in “code”.
No matter how many times I’ve laid out the Latin syllables which are each indicated by a single “Voynich” character, my discussions are promptly buried. Welcome to what will soon become the “graveyard” (figuratively speaking).
Here are some “key” syllables represented by a single mystery character or number:
number eight: “aes”
small number nine: “ex”
large number nine: “ceus” or “geus”
elaborate large “P” figure: “b” or “p” (which can become more elaborate to form words such as species, prescribe)
“fish-hook” looking characters: one barb “n”, two barbs “m”
Backward-facing “hand-sickle” shape: sibilant before a leading vowel,
Backward-facing “S” shape represents the sound of “R”
On now countless pages (not only Nick’s) I have not hesitated to validate my translations with proofs and citations. The more proofs I offer, the deeper I get buried. Perhaps I am being viewed as a “spoil sport”?
🙂
Dear all,
If the VM is copywork from a much earlier era, then I think that dating the ink (maybe C-14 on binders helps?) is not going to take us anyway. It seems reasonable that the writing was done contemporaneous with the vellum prep. But if the scribes were working on ancient texts, we have only the decrypts to help us, or as an adjunct, something like art history techniques, such as the parallel hatching that Nick has pointed out.I think it likely that the botanical illustrations were done soon after the vellum preparation. Nick has gone into “bleedthrough” from r to v and v to r on most of the botanicals. Many are pretty even but some show little (f34,46,55) or asymmetric (some where r transfers to v mainly (e.g. f31, 32, 50) but more cases where v transfers mainly to r (f35,38,39,40,41,43). Something odd happened to 38v indicating that the drawing on f38r may originally have differed from that seen now. There is some transfer of color also from 56r to 55v and also f42v to 43r. I think what apparently was the same ink color (and non corrosiveness as Diane points out) likely indicates the plant line drawings were done close to the text writing and that the many examples of parallel hatching indicates these were not done later but were at the same time as the drawings. Some color, but not a lot, is original also. So what might this indicate. The drawings were not copied but were just done in the idiosyncratic style common when the text was laid down. The text is aligned nearly perfectly with the plant line drawings suggesting that this text at least was laid down with the drawings in place. I think it is likely that only further burrowing into such art history techniques as parallel hatching can we assign a time frame for the creation of the VM contents. The line drawings of the plants are very skillfully done, scarcely an error, although some small line gaps can be spotted. I think yin and yang symbols abound in the botanical section, probably indicating a non-European origin although alchemists, some from Europe, loved that stuff. I think the obvious weirdnesses in the drawings, particularly the roots, implies a medicinal use for the plants and some appear very specific such as lumps or even little bristly spheres or cube like inclusions in roots. I am guessing these refer to the plant’s use to help expell kidney or bladder stones. Where leaves appear fused, I don’t think this is a drawing error but rather indicates the plant was useful for superficial wound healing. Where stems join from adjoining sprouts, I think this indicates a plant use for bone-healing. Where one stem actually penetrates another, this could be used in puncture wounds as battlefield injuries.
Bd1dr
Arcadia, huh?
Dear all,
A lot of work is out there using two techniques for DNA work on parchment (vellum). Before digestion of a sample for mitochondrial DNA work, intestigators often will do a stable carbon/ nitrogen isotope ratio. This deviates from values for collagens from various animals as well as from contamination, which turns out to be very common. A tiny sample (ca. 1.5 milligram) is usually used with mass spectrometry or X-ray diffraction for the C/N ratios. Then unfortunately, for m-DNA work, a larger sample (200 mm^2) is taken for digestion after a protocol of acid and base treatments. This can distinguish however between skins taken from the same animal and another animal in the herd. One investigator indicated English parchment was likely from sheep whereas French parchments were likely from sheep and calves. Not much yet on goats that I have found as I think that was less common in the European focus of the studies I have seen. The calf is usually less than 11 months old. Pig was even used in some instances and even human skin (uggh!); these omnivores differ from herbivores.. Because mitochrondrial DNA is inherited from the mother, the kinship of certain skins can be determined, e.g. if the same mother is involved or different mothers. The C/N ratios (representing those of collagen) differ also among different parchment sources and even specific species. Will dig more into this but maybe this is something for a front burner?
One idea did cross my mind and that is in a case of asymmetric bleeding of color, e.g. v onto r, maybe the v side was the non-hide side? .
To “B”, Unfortunately, for the remaining Latinists, “eam” can be “that” in Latin. It is all over the place, on every botanical folio in several places.
I think there was one botanical illustration likely where fresh (green) or dried (brown) leaves were used for plague and the leaves do resemble little mice hanging by their tails. I went into this sometime back but have forgotten the folio number. BTW plague was carried by mice as well as rats.
Thomas: remember that in normal gathering / quire construction, flesh faces flesh and hide faces hide (because that’s what you get when you fold larger sheets down). So if there are flesh sides facing hide sides, they’re probably in the wrong order. 😉
Nick
thank you.
Diane
Quacquelben’s identification of that plant was “scoria”. So, I looked up “scoria” in various current-day botanical discussions. I found “dioscorides”. I only referred to the “nickname” for that plant which is commonly called “yam” in the countries where it is still cultivated for human edibility.
On various other “Voynich” folios, one will find more references to Dioscorides (the earliest “medicine man”?).
Aye, Nick, I echo Diane in thanking you for your consideration of our somewhat convoluted posts!
beady-eyed wonder
Nick, Thanks for the reminder. I think that intensity of color applied has something also to do with bleed through but you might be right that if asymmetric bleed through is occurring, and colors (deep green loves to transfer) are equivalent,, that this could indicate something odd with the VM’s binding into quires.
Suppose that the nymphs are not symbolic but depictions of locals? And those pools are real. I think we can say this from the illustrations in the bathing section: The pools are shallow and most are man made as indicated by the faint parallel lines in stone, concrete or just wood. I argue that they might represent the cisterns of the Greek island of Chios in the eastern Aegean. If the nymphs are real and not symbols of mythology or whatever, can we not guess at the period from hair styles and the frequent use of the hair clasp? Looks medieval to my eye. The hair styles feature the braid a lot but not much in the way of pigtails.
Dear all, The botanical illustration I was referring to in my post of yesterday is f45r. It did occur to me that if this plant was indeed used to treat the bubonic plague affecting Asia Minor, the Crimea and Europe, this might indicate a 14-15C date. This alone does not rule out a classical origin for the VM text and illustrations as various plagues have been with mankind for centuries but that carried by fleas of mice and rats particularly seems to have been on the radar screens of medieval medics. For good reason as it wiped out 1/3rd of the population of Europe. I think for an ID of the plant, we cannot resort to the illustration but will have to await a decrypt of that page. If the leaves are actually claimed to resemble mice, this would be a fantastic reach for the “doctrine of signatures”!
Thomas
“can we not guess at the period from hair styles”
No. Not unless the set chosen for comparison happens to include the region and time in which all characteristics occur.
What often happens here is that the comparative set is pre-determined. Having decided that the manuscript, in both manufacture and content will be medieval, European and from the Latin tradition, the set for comparison is usually limited to medieval Latin imagery.
But if you compare a pomegranate with nothing but apples your result will be a match with the apple looking most like a pomegranate.
The same is true for stylistics. You have to find not just versions of the ‘crown and veil’, but occurrences which appear in the same region and time as bodies drawn as the ‘nymphs’ are – with overlarge heads, swollen bellies, deformed faces etc. And all this in combination with use of close-set parallel lines to indicate surface and volume.
etc.etc.
As a point of fact, even in the Mediterranean, the ‘crown and veil’ were seen in women’s costume from the archaic period onwards. Bobby pins come somewhat later, i believe.
Thomas: I was hoping we might be able to do more with this kind of analysis too, but Diane very politely but firmly said no, and on reflection I think she’s right.
If you could find another manuscript whose illustrations really do resemble the Voynich in terms of stylistics, technical aspects and content, I think that would be one thing. (Diane?). But none of these aspects is sufficient on its own. Otherwise, you get a superficial resemblance rather than anything structural.
As far as the Black Death is concerned, I don’t think the connection with rats/mice/marmots was made until much later. I think that fourteenth century writers thought the plague was to do with some form of ‘bad air’, which perhaps explains why more effective counter-measures weren’t taken. Can anyone more knowledgeable on this help?
Sir Hubert,
As far as stylistics goes, I think it’s best to treat each section separately, or obvious ‘pairs’ together. So the botanical and ‘pharma’ section together or the ‘nymphs’ folios together.
For the last, I’m convinced that both Voynich and Panofsky were correct in seeing the forms given the bodies as early, and probably c.13thC or so. I’d place that section (as Panofsky did) ‘somewhere southern’ though he apparently didn’t know ms Sassoon 823, and so shifted his proposed date to the 15thC because he knew of no ‘shapely ladies’ in earlier manuscripts from Spain. Even so the head-dresses are re-presentations of types we find in abundance on coins etc. from the early centuries AD – especially as tyches. Some types seen then re-appear in medieval costume, too.
Other sections of the ms have a very different air, and different stylistic habits.
Dear all, Sir Hubert is quite correct in that rodents were not known as vectors for bubonic plague until much, much later than the 14-15thC dates proposed for the VM. I extrapolated unwisely from the reports of Verdanyan on Armenian medicine that they had remedies for the plague in the 14thC BUT nowhere is it indicated that they knew it was carried by rodents. So that line of inquiry comes to a halt. One does wonder though what the devil those mouse-like leaves are for? Just a mouse-repellent for good housekeeping? Or protecting stored crops?
I am not giving up however on trying to find embedded clues in the illustrations of the VM as a way of proposing a date for when the content was laid down. Diane is likely right that we have to approach the VM by sections. I am not even completely certain that all sections of the pharma are done at one time as the botanicals. Many of the herbs overlap with the botanicals, it is true, and one like that having the elephant shaped herb which I think is black plantain and was used for elephantiasis, is even more graphic and suggestive than the elephant spotted in the roots of one of the botanicals by Nick long ago. Unless we can decrypt the VM, the visual clues are all we have to go with at the moment. Diane has been mining this vein for longer than anyone and has made her anti-Eurocentric position well known. I tend to agree but my Armenian fixation has few adherants.
But Diane, I only asked one question with my last post! Ennyway, today I am posting from our latest & greatest new computer. So, forgive me, y’all, if I seem somewhat more incoherent than usual Today, I am just 1dr-ing if anyone has followed up on my leads to the connections between Busbecq, Suleiman, Ferdinand I of Austria, and Rudolph II. Poor Rudolph II ended up with the menagerie that Suleiman gifted to Ferdinand I via Ogier Ghiselen de Busbecq’s return to Ferdinand’s court.
Over the past several months I’ve referred to two very relevant (to this “Voynich” discussion) books, “The Turkish Letters of Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq”, and “Tulipomania” by Mike Dash. Here’s a big fat book by Caroline Finkel (doctorate in Ottoman history from School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London): “OSMAN’S DREAM”. I am halfway through her 660-page tome. I can tell immediately where I stopped reading last by the little pink scraps I use to write “key words” to find my way back to relevant discussions.
Surely, Nick, you can establish some kind of communication with her — even if it is to better understand what I am babbling about? And maybe we can all see the possibility that Busbecg may have had a limited supply of very elderly parchment/vellum with which to record his travels through the Ottoman Empire.
Dear Thomas,
Actually, I’d go further than that. Even if the text of the Voynich turns out to be a hoax (don’t shoot me), the images remain a product of their time and may have much to tell us about how and why the hoax itself was created.
But I still think phrases like “a date for when the content was laid down” require careful thought, and I hope this doesn’t come over as theoretical hair-splitting.
We can say with confidence that the Voynich itself was physically written in the first few decades of the fifteenth century, almost certainly in Europe. What we cannot tell until we decipher the text is whether and to what extent it copies, abridges or otherwise modifies works written by others, or whether it is in fact an original composition (although this seems rather less likely).
If the text was ultimately derived from previous works, we can’t know whether the illustrations were copied directly from an earlier MS, modernised in some way, or, again, devised from scratch. But I still hope that someone may yet notice a detail somewhere which is so unusual and so specific that it leads us to a very particular source. Or maybe they already have – I’ve not been on this blog very long…
Thomas,
I think that most, if not all the matter now in the manuscript had arrived in the western Mediterranean by (I’d say) mid-12th to mid-13thC.
By the ‘botanical’ section/s I mean all the plant-pictures.
I avoid ‘herbal’ – it assumes much more than we know and tends to bias efforts to identify the subject of each picture.
I’d be very interested to know what Armenians prescribed for plague.
bdid1dr,
Here are some “key” syllables represented by a single mystery character or number:
number eight: “aes”
small number nine: “ex”
large number nine: “ceus” or “geus”
What do you make of “8g8g8g”, occurring in both f14r (fourth line from the bottom) and f43r (first line, bottom paragraph)?
http://brbl-media.library.yale.edu/images/1006101_quarter.jpg
http://brbl-media.library.yale.edu/images/1006158_quarter.jpg
Perhaps Mindy has some insight into this?
Job: my suspicion is that the signification of word initial “8-” changes significantly through the pages. On f14v (not f14r as you note), about 20% of the “words” begin with “8-“, a figure which I believe is much higher than elsewhere in the MS.
This might be an helpful dimension to use when trying to reconstruct the evolution of the underlying system. 🙂
Nick, thanks for the correction, f14v is what i was referring to.
Folios f25v and f32r have about the same high level of word-initial “8”s – f32r is slightly higher:
http://brbl-media.library.yale.edu/images/1006123_quarter.jpg
http://brbl-media.library.yale.edu/images/1006136_quarter.jpg
The stats are more or less the following for folios with more than 25% of word-initial “8”s:
f5v 26.7%
f7v 30.1%
f11r 29.8%
f11v 27.1%
f13r 25.6%
f14v 35.3%
f19r 28.9%
f22r 28.3%
f23r 27.4%
f25v 35.1%
f32r 36.4%
f32v 29.4%
f37v 31.8%
f38v 29.2%
f65r 33.3%
By the way, what do you think about the possibility of the author having used nulls throughout the text? In your opinion, how large, relative to the cipher text, would you guess that the plain text is?
Less than 50%? More?
Nick: either that, or someone was being lazy with the Cardan grille on that particular folio 😉
Job: I’ve long said that I think the plaintext and ciphertext occupied exactly the same proportion of the page – that each line (or, rather, set of lines) of the plaintext was copied onto a wax tablet and enciphered in place there, before being handed off to a scribe to write in place on the enciphered page.
There may be nulls, but I’d be somewhat surprised: one key part of the cipher system seems (to me) to be based on verbose cipher (which would tend to expand the size of the text), and so the encipherer’s main challenge ould have been finding practical ways of abbreviating the text to make it fit the same “form factor” as the original text.
Voynichese, to this way of thinking, is an abbreviated verbose cipher. But for someone of that era, that was OK: whereas we moderns remember very little, in those pre-printing days (early printed books were hugely expensive!) everyone had to remember things as a matter of course.
So I suspect the point of the Voynich’s cipher system will turn out to have been more as an aide-memoire than as a pure mathematical encipherment. Which of course makes our job many times harder, but it is what it is. 🙂
Job: incidentally, the interesting angle to derive 8- stats from would be per bifolio – i.e. which bifolios have the highest joint 8- stats?
If the 8- stats cluster strongly on a per-bifolio basis, then it might be a good indication which ones were written in a single sub-phase (i.e. before the encipherer changed his/her mind about 8- being a good idea). 😉
Job: oh, and you might want to separate out the “8ai[i][i]v” and “8ai[i][i]r” groups from your stats, as I think these groups are more consistent over the whole MS – it’s the other “8-” words that I suspect are more indicative of a phase shift.
SirHubert: wash – your – mouth – out – with – soap – and – go – to – bed – NOW.
I won’t have language like that on my blog. 😉
Sorry all i am on a 24 hour shift… just noticed the posts. Job, I have not looked at either folio before just now. I don’t know what 8g8g8g means, but I do know what 8g8g means, and I do know what 8aiiiv and 8aiiir mean. I will look at the pages as I have time d my shift and get back to you.
I think it would be best if I translate the whole page of 14v. In that manner I could ensure the words were all correct. Some words, such as the 8aiiiv word, have more than one meaning (much like the English word run has a bunch of different meanings). As it stands now, the word prior to 8g8g8g appears to mean “perfect”. I will post again shortly.
Nick,
I don’t know if it will help, but i think that folio’s image includes reference to agar-wood (the liver-like red section, especially). Agar-woods were highly prized as medicine and as wood for carved objects, such as furniture or items of costume etc. In this case, I think both uses might be mentioned in the text.
Which makes me wonder if perhaps the text’s evolution mightn’t relate to movement through the various routes of trade.
Just a thought.
Terms for agar woods include
oud, oodh or agar
gaharu
Ch’en Hsiang / Chenxiang Chen Xiang.
but I suppose more relevant to the period would be New Persian, or other lingua franca.
Also these days agarwood is identified with the old ‘eaglewood’ of earlier Chinese texts, though the species known as ‘chickenwood’ in older texts is now beieved extinct.
Cheers
To all, I am having a hard time staying awake so please bear with me.(24 hr shifts are not much fun). I have not looked at agar wood at all (not even one picture) but once again I would agree at least initially with Diane because I am about half way through translating, and the story appears to be about oedepus. Thebes is referenced, a tale of misfortune, a name similar to oedipus, and the outcome of smallpox, along with a couple of women and a baby. Things I have not identified are the common names such as antigone, Jocasta, creon… none the less, The last paragraph talks about outcome of smallpox. agar wood is a supposed remedy for smallpox.
Type of skin used for vellum/parchment mfg (abbreviation for manufacturing):would depend on whether one wanted vellum or parchment. Another interesting note made by Busbecq was how the angora goats had their hair removed from the living animal. They didn’t shear the hair but rather pulled the strands loose. So it is likely that “kidskin” would have been a more commonly used manuscript material for “vellum”. At least in those parts of the world (Ancyra/Angora//Ankara) where long-haired goats were raised for both hair (spun or felted) or meat.
ThomS, Diane, & Mindy,if you haven’t already read a very good book written by Elisabeth Wayland Barber “Women’s Work-The fFirst 20,000 Years”, you may find it as interesting as I do.
Dear all, I think “B” has a point. Goat might have been used for the vellum of the VM. That would make a European origin not impossible, but less likely. I think mitochrondrial DNA should be determined for a little strip (1-200mm) of a good selection from each of the 17 quires that Nick (I hope I remembered that correctly) has determined make up the VM.
To Diane, plague for the Armenians was prevented/treated with some mineral mixed with wine. This was an odd habit of the Armenians, using crushed minerals and even gem stones, including diamond (for the worst afflictions). I am guessing that overuse of dietary minerals (note one in the pharma section) probably helped make elephantiasis so prevalent among Armenians. I will search again for the exact mineral(s) as it was mentioned in passing in one of Verdanyan’s many essays on Armenian medicine.
To Sir Hubert. Why do you think that the VM’s text and illustrations were created “almost certainly in Europe”? It seems to me, that European traders, particularly from Italy e.g. Venetians and Genoese, were all over the Mediterranean and Asia minor, so that we cannot be certain that the VM might not have come for example, from Kaffa in the Crimea or from one of the Greek islands controlled by either city state?
Dear all, For those who would enjoy a lengthy read on Armenian medicine, Stella Verdanyan has written a fine review at: http://z4.invisionfree.com/Armenian_History/index.php?showtopic=90
For those who persist to the end, note the illustrations from a 16thC herbal that incorporates the ampersand. In general, the great medics of the medieval period like Amasiatsi, herbs were hugely important although minerals also played a role as they did in Arabic medicine of Ibn Sina and others.
For Diane, In early times plague and tuberculosis were considered similar enough to merit the same treatment, the use of Armenian bolus or Ani clay, an aluminosilicate mineral that also contained iron oxide. Galen and Ibn Sina both praised its properties in wound healing and treatment of plague. Amasiatsi is also mentioned as having a treatment for plague but not clear what that was.
Thomas: fair question. The received position on the origin of the manuscript itself qua physical object seems to be summarized here:
http://www.voynich.nu/origin.html
I’m sure there are disagreements over the details, but I’m not aware that this has been superseded – though I’m always happy to be corrected.
I also have vague memories of further study being done on the vellum itself. I don’t think it was goat, and I think it was felt to be consistent with a Central European origin. But I don’t know whether it would also be consistent with other origins too.
Good “morning” everyone. Now that I’ve had a chance to catch up on my sleep, I have looked at the agar plant. (My apologies by the way for not finishing translations. I had to stop because I was getting too tired, and needed to remain awake. I will resume shortly.)
First, however, I want to retract my support for agar wood now that I’ve had a chance to look at the plant. (Sorry Diane) In my opinion, the plant on the page most closely resembles one of the Baneberry plants (all similar, i would probably discount the red Baneberry though, since there does not appear to be red pigment on the berries in the picture). One of the Baneberry plants native to Eurasia was used for a number of medicinal remedies (although I have not yet found a reference to it being used for small pox), and is extremely poisonous.
Here are two decent sites for pictures of the variation of the plant I believe it is most closely related to:
http://www.luontoportti.com/suomi/fr/kukkakasvit/actee-en-epi
(On this page, the best picture is the final picture, bottom right, which shows the long stems of berries and the leaves.)
commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:17_Actaea_spicata.jpg
(this one shows a reddish root system.)
Okay….now I shall go back to translation. I will post translation updates later.
Job, I’ve just returned from the Bay Area. Just now saw your query regarding my translation of the two sizes of what look like figure “9”. I shall try to clarify:
When a large figure “9” appears anywhere in the text other than at the end of a phrase or botanical terminology, it simply represents the hard sound of “G” or “K” (as in gasoline, or kitchen). The smaller “9” represents the sound of “ks” as in brakes, parks, or tax, excuse, exclaim…..
Nick,
Philip Neal recently posted to the Voynich mailing list his ‘algorithm’ for Voynich word-generation.
I’d appreciate your take on it.
The post can be seen through ‘Gameszoo’. The comment is dated
Tue, 30 Jul 2013 23:30:49 -0600.
Thanks
SirHubert,
While there is no doubt that Rene Zandbergen’s site struggles to present only certainties, it is inevitable that no-one’s personal views can avoid influencing their perceptions of data.
It is too much to expect any one person’s site to be definitive. Just as example, though the C-14 date sets a limit of 1438, which one might stretch a little, Zandbergen adds more than a decade’s leeway, saying ‘…1450’. Some would think this margin greater than the evidence warrants. Others would disagree.
Similarly, with much else on voynich.nu, where established data points are necessarily matched by interpretation.
It is not a flaw, or criticism, merely a reminder that to be fair we shouldn’t suppose any one person an authority whose web-page or blog statements are authoritative.
Thomas may be interested to explore the implications of mineral-based pigments for his Armenian thesis.
Oh boy, Nick! I am thrilled to see that both Mr. Neal & Mr. Zandbergen have (maybe) been following our latest Boenicke 408 discussions. I’m hoping Mr. Z will understand my references to the “mushroom folio” as being an illustrated discussion of the effects of eating the wrong specie of the “inky” mushroom family: coprinacae. The illustrations accompany the discussion of the disorientation and hallucinations, and the mythic origins of the discussion: The legend of Alcyone and her lover/husband Ceyx. The terms “halcyon” and “hallucin” are derived from that mythological story (which is written on all four sides & center of that multi-folded folio: “Voynich” folio 86 r 3.
Dear all, On “pharma weirdnesses”. I have come late to the Voynichfest but even the most cursory examination of the pharma section indicates a great degree of “crowdyness”. I am likely not the first to comment on this but there are many cases where one of the herbal leaves or roots actually is obscured by the apothecary jar; others brush right up against the jars. The jars seem as elaborate as the space allows but even there (see top of f100r and f100v) is seen a total absense of the usually careful graphic work of the botanical section. My guess is that the plant parts came first and maybe a skeched out, more modest receptacle was initially provided on the left margin and this was elaborated on at a later date taking up more space that was even suitable to perhaps impress some viewer(s) or potential owner? Then the text was added. Note the base of the second jar on f89v has been redrawn.Some coloration is carefully done,(e.g. 88v) and some is just mediocre.(f89v). It appears that the final coloration was done in the remote past as a fair amount of bleed through, particularly of the green jar bases is observed e.g. 88v folios).
Dear all, I think there is German in the VM but it emerges after some test decrypts. Words like nacht, echt. I hold that “rot” is not one of them. I have argued that it is arabic and has to be viewed side-ways with the bottom of glyphs on the left.
I remain unconvinced of the unambiguous European origin of the VM. Rene, who has done an impressive job summarizing the hard facts of the VM, has gone into the zodiac rondels but ignores the “elephant in the room”. The creature for Scorpio is not a scorpion at all, but a FOUR legged croc like monster about to devour a child. This, so far as I can tell, is NOT in the European zodiac tradition. If there were no palimpsests, how was Terpenec’s name removed? Real lead was used to mark paper and parchment but this was rare.
Incidentally, I seem to recall one comment by McCrone et al.and that was the pigments were ground in a manner consistent with the middle ages. My daughter who is an art conservator (and only mildly interested in the VM), told me one that a simple hand lens can be very useful in authenticating the pigments used in painting. Modern pigments are ground much more finely that the pigments of yesteryear which were ground by hand and led to particles that were larger and also had rough edges. Some art forgers ignore this simple fact.
I think the “red lead” traces that Nick spotted on one of the botanicals, might indicate that the VM botanicals were not copied from another source, but were drawn in iron gall ink following a preliminary sketch laid down with red d=lead that was normally erased. So room would have been allowed for text which might have even been written before the final inkining and coloration. The original coloration is virually flawless, the parts that remain. We cannot judge the colorist by the later slap dash work that wouldn’t challege a school kid (who probably also “ran with scissors”). .
Dear anyone & all,
Several weeks/few months ago, Nick posed a comparison of two folios which seem to be discussing the same plants. One of which had had its roots portrayed and the other its leaves: the pharmaceutical jar’s commentary/instructions were to mix the leaves of one plant with the roots of the other and to make a “cold” solution. Nick may be able to bring up that particular, short-lived discussion page so you can compare my translation therein with this latest discussion here.
Let’s get cookin’ folks! 🙂
Nick, i’m not seeing a clear distribution pattern for uncommon words starting with EVA “d”.
For example, here is a dump of uncommon words that start with EVA “d”, for each folio – where uncommon means that each such word occurs in less than five folios:
http://voynichms.appspot.com/page/uncommon-words-starting-with-eva-d-by-folio.html
There is some fluctuation, but no real clustering.
Job: hmmm… I know the 8- behaviour I’m trying to describe, but I’m obviously not doing a very good job of it. I’ll have another look at this and try to describe it in a way that can be captured. 🙂
OK, all: Let us put aside the urge to obfuscate. Diane, thank you for referring me to Nick’s attempt to decode the same phrase which derailed Edith Sherwood (and many Voynicheros):
Boenicke manuscript 408 (NICK-named “Voynich):
Folio 116 v:
top two lines TRANSLATES to Ancyranum monumentum Augustus
If I can’t convince you by translating some 15 “Voynich” folios into the language being spoken here (and on other of Nick’s Voynich discussion pages), may I suggest you all visit the archaelogical digs which are ongoing at the Ancyranum Monument at Ankara.
Dear all, Straining maybe overmuch to find some intrinsic art history clue that might help date and place the VM botanicals, I wonder if three dimensionality that is seen in a primitive way in many of the VM drawings might provide a clue? Other illustrated medieval herbals (see Bodleian’s illustrated herbal from 12thC (Apuleius based on Dioscorides) and compare them with those of Tradescant’s Orchard (water colors, 1620) where, in the latter, there is a clear cut 3D effect as one fruit-laden branch is clearly behind another. Little effort is made in the earlier work and things are laid out pretty much in a plane with not much of an effort to create a sense of three dimensionality. The VM has made at least a passing effort to indicate 3D, particularly with plants stressing rhizomes and residual platforms from which plants have been harvested (“cut and come again” or perenials (e.g. 23r, 26r, 27vm 28r, 32r, 35r, 36r, 37v, 39r etc., etc. So when was three dimensionality considered useful in drawing in the early to mid 15thC? I will dig more on this topic (I doubt I am the first) in a book I have just purchased by Minta Collins.. I believe it was Kenneth Clark who observed that perspective originated with the Arabs in Spain in the early renaissance and THEN was picked up by the great Italian masters, like Piero.. No obvious perspective or shading is seen in the VM herbals but there is a tentative effort at indicating three dimensionality.I do plan to research Armenian pigments as they might have appered in the VM (likely as inks) but I am guessing the original color that remains and is the only thing worth paying attention to, really represents only about five colors, a light green, a dark green, a brown (maybe two shades), a yellow and a pale blue. The red could be a game changer but it looks of recent vintage. Note that it tends not to bleed through at all (although it does transfer) and I suspect was touched up from time to time. All quiet otherwise on the Armenian front. Cheers
To any interested, an interjection in re plague “remedies”:
Too bad that most (even well-educated) persons did not understand that when they killed all the cats in their vicinity, the mice and rats were free to spread the flea-borne plague. Once the bubonic disease evolved into respiratory transmission mode, all bets were off.
Just consider how difficult it must have been for “educator’s” to maintain any semblance of continuity of the record — for several hundred years!
ThomS: Several months ago, on Nick’s page “David Kahn at the Athenaeum”: I mentioned that I had fully translated one of Tiltman’s efforts with Vms folio 49v – The Turban Ranunculus.
I also told Nick that I had fully translated two other “Tiltman” Vms folios: 33v “Scabiosa Caucasica” and 56r Dianthus.
So far, no one has indicated any interest in my full translations into the Latin words/phrases AND my translation of the Latin into English. I guess I should have been translating the Latin into Deutch ? French ? Czechoslovakian? Armenian
By the way, Job, The EVA (developed by Nick and friends?) using D’Imperio’s nonsensical, totally confabulating booklet, has not yet been able to “decode” the Vms, much less translate the manuscript’s very easily read base language (Latin).
Do a little research into Mary D’Imperio’s role in “decoding” the VMs. I place no onus on the military code specialists’ attempts at “decoding”. If I remember correctly at least one of the military codiologists came very close to a nervous breakdown. I have great respect for those men (including Brigadier General Tiltman).
D’Imperio was a secretary. She had no role in the decoding efforts.
Dear all, A wonderful link to Sloane #4016 can be found at a web site of the British Museum. Enter “Tractatus de herbis” on Google. This is an Italian (N. Lombardy) herbal from 1440. Many oddnesses here like weird looking animals on many pages, some appear zodiacal but others like a really weird elephant are not. Muted colors, mainly browns and greens abound. Some tan and very little red. Anyway, to my eye, it looks strictly 2D, with maybe one exception (f64v). It is small (360×255 mm) and in parchment. The illustrations-all can be seen-number over 200.
To b: I have been to the temple of the divine C. Augustus in Ankara, Turkey. Ankara is (to me) among the least interesting cities in Turkey; guess that is why it is the capital. Outside of the final resting place of Ataturk which is worth the trip, and some old Romerstuf, nothing to write home about. Ankara, for those who care about such things, comes from anchor, one of which was found there (way inland, figure that out? Maybe Noah’s?). Anyway, b, why would the weird VM pile on additional weirdness with this colophon-like three line phrase on f116v? Your first word looks sort of OK (or actually pretty good), but honestly, the rest requires a real act of faith to buy into. Why so many glyphs for just two more words? Why end with this reference to that temple? The temple is in pretty fair shape, all things considered so I was not aware of the dig going on and will have to research that. Looking for another anchor maybe?
Those first lines of script on folio 116v have been the downfall of countless current-years “decoders” (including our host Nick and his faithful follower Diane). “Nihil obstat” was as close as Nick was able to “decode” that phrase. When I asked Diane where I could find Nick’s “nihil obstat” discussion she directed me to that particular discussion. Perhaps Diane could, once again, direct us to Nick’s nihil obstat discussion?
Back on track to Ankara and the ” monumentum ancyranum res divi Augustus….. I’ve just discovered that Carolus Clusius first toured the Ottoman territories (including Ancara/Ancyrus/Angora). So, since both Busbecq and Clusius were prolific writers, I guess I have to hie myself back to Leyden/Leiden University’s huge archive of medieval correspondence. Fascinating but quite a strain on my one eye still capable of reading. I’ll be “keeping an eye out” for Dodoens also.
😉
Dear B
Forgive a personal comment, but you are lucky. I can’t imagine my husband would have been cheerful about demands to travel half-way across the US, and then to Europe, in pursuit of a mere hobby. Kudos to you both.
Dear B
You comment on my being a follower of Mr. Pelling’s blog made me smile. I hardly think of it as a blog – you and so many others make it more like a daily newspaper – the articles the news, and the comments like letters to the late-lamented ‘Times’ (as was).
In fact, I read this ‘Cryptography’ times more assiduously than my papers, since the news tends to be more interesting, and the letters-to-editor much more amusing.
dearD, how about a news column “Dum Dianae Daily”?
Heh! 🙂
DearD, Perhaps mention of “Sweet William” may turn your cheeks “Pink”? Ah, puns aside, and just a “touch” of humor, I suspect our hero may be donating to this discussion just in the “Nick” of time!
Eh, Nick? Heh!
DearThomS, I can certainly understand your Armenian points of view in re the Vms. Just how many centuries of conflict/conquering are remembered by Armenian historians. Cypriots also have long memories – and record them. One by one, my Cypriot neighbor takes her children to Cyprus, as they come of age.
I also note just how few are current-day discussions about early Christian Armenians in Jerusalem. Never mind that the Templar Knights occupied a good size piece of the Armenian neighborhood (as did the Knights of the White Cross).
I mention the Templar Knights because of what happened to them when they returned to Philip le Bel’s court. Another whole chunk of European history buried in obfuscation.
Dear all, so I have been working on folio 65 v, and am nearing completion. The page flipped to the next one, 66r, while I was re-examining it and I saw the woman with a chunk out of her middle. I was hoping the words would translate to what was going on, but the first word translates most nearly as on my honor. The second word translates as woman, and the third word says the woman’s country of origin. I don’t know that I will get to the translation of this page for a while because it is a long one, and I like to do the shorter ones since it gives me practice in the language, and it gives me a full short account I can historically verify. However, I am now very curious about the story contained within. The story on the previous page ( all but 4 words translated, all but 9 verified) like others i have translated, is about the hope for an heir. I have not yet looked into the plant on the page. From what I can tell, as with the other pages, it does not say the name of the plant.
Well, hope everyone is enjoying their day. Oh, by the way, on folio I have come up with one other word which also closely resembles smallpox in the language’s current letters…I am still trying to get that page completed so I can definitively say if it is smallpox or the other translation possibility. Sorry that page has not been completed yet.
To back up my current reference to “Ancyranum…….”, I refer you to Nick’s “Unsvelte Voynich” page where I first posted my translation (about a month ago). Some argumentation there in re “sheep” or “goat”. I also mentioned to Diane that Suleiman’s favorite garment was a “watered camlet” (per Busbecq’s “Letters”).
Just trying to maintain continuity of the very relevant discussion in re Ancyranum monumentum res divae Augustus…….(folio 116 v of the “Voynich” mss, aka Boenicke manuscript 408)
In her book “Osman’s Dream” (pages 28-30), Caroline Finkel discusses Tamerlane’s and Bayezid’s armies meeting near Ankara 28 July 1402. I finally stopped reading for today at page 58 — with dealings of the Genoese and Venetians – and Greeks – and Byzantines are all preparing for war on one front or another! Edirne, Trebizond, Anatolia and Constantinople/Istanbul (just to name a few). I still haven’t been able to find the website which discusses two “Treaties of Nymphae” which were trade agreements approximately 100 years apart – I vaguely recall the website as being maintained by an Armenian historian. Perhaps ThomS might know of this?
Correction to my earlier post: There were two treaties of “NymphaEUM” (in 1214ad and 1261ad). They were mostly involved with parceling out the spoils of war (4th Crusade)(the sack of Constantinople). Lots of “stuff” going on. Google or Wiki “Treaty of Nymphaeum” , and see what I mean. 🙂
bdid1dr, the primary purpose of a transcription alphabet such as EVA is not to act as decoding or translation mechanism, it’s simply another representation of the data in the text that is more amenable to computer based processing.
Consistency is really the most important attribute of a transcription. I’ve spotted some questionable word boundaries in transcribed EVA text but my opinion so far, having overlayed an EVA transcription on quite a few folios, is that it is largely consistent and reliable.
In re Mindy’s observation of a woman “with a chunk out of her middle”: that picture may very well have been referring to a “caesarian” operation used with difficult childbirth labor. We don’t call that surgical procedure “caesarian” for nothing. Look up the “history” Mindy. 🙂
So, Job: Are you planning, any time soon, to post some of your EVA-based translations here on this page of discussion? There is a very good expression I use occasionally: “The proof is in the pudding”. Unfortunately, many of my proofs, which I put in the pudding of Nick’s various topics, often get buried under obfuscating dialogues which immediately follow nearly ALL of my discussions/proofs.
It is a good thing I take the time to print-out my various discussions (including this latest).
😉
(big grin with a wink)
bdid1dr
Item for Mindy, in re Caesarian birth (& its relevance within the Voynich manuscript: “A history of caesarean section: From ancient world to the modern era — Donald Todman, Brisbane Clinic, 79 Wickham Terrace, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia (Excerpt from “Australian and New Zealand Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology 2007;47:357-361
Of particular interest is a woodcut illustration from Lives of the Twelve Caesars (1506 edition) Courtesy National Library of Medicine
So, I am becoming even more convinced that Busbecq was writing his “travelogue/diary” on fifteenth century manuscript material (vellum/parchment). Voynich manuscript folio 116v discussion of the monumentum augustus (at Ancyra) is Busbecq’s reference to the child (Julius Caesar) whose mother Aurelia Cotta survived Caesar’s birth (and buried him 55 years later).
I’m still working on other “hunches” in re Busbecq’s travel diary.
bdid1dr, the best you’ll get from me is some concrete analysis on the properties of the VMS contents and some auxiliary data to help you form and test your own theories.
As Nick noted, it will take some comprehensive knowledge, encompassing different fields of study, to decode or translate the manuscript.
Realistically I will not be putting forth any proposed translation or decoding methods – my interests are almost exclusively comp-sci oriented and likely to remain that way.
See what happens when I try to be brief? Ennyway, both Julius Caesar and his mother survived the surgical procedure. Julius went on to sponsor/adopt Augustus. Post mortem monuments of Augustus apparently proliferated throughout the then Roman-occupied territories.
Job, I again post my query: Have you been able to post proofs of sensible/readable EVA transcriptions?
By the way (I’ll try to be succinct) I can read, with 80-90% comprehension in Spanish, French, German, Dutch/Indonesian, Italian, “Medicalese” “Lawyerese”, and grammatical English. I can also communicate in ASL (American Sign Language). I gave up on Irish/Gaelic!
No need to applaud! 🙂
Oh boy! I’ve just gotten back from cruising the Met Museum’s huge manuscript archives. This time I MAY be able to even cite a url. In the meantime, I’ll also refer you to the references:
Hellbrunn Timeline of Art History
The Art of the Timurid Period (ca. 1370-1507)
You will know you are on the right track if the page shows 14 items which you can click to review. Item 8, two people sitting on a bench — click to open (and click again to enlarge if you need to). Wait until you see the black and white “cartoon” which appears below the bench-sitters! Incredible!
Dear bdid1dr, boy, you are a crochety one aren’t you? I see you dish a lot of snide comments to a lot of people and I wonder how people are still so polite to you. Yes, I know cesarean sections occurred. However I also know if I put “The woman who looks like she is having a cesarean section” you will likely make some other comment such as, “who did you copy that from, surely it isn’t an original idea”. I do not put the items I put for you to diss..although I do see you seem to enjoy dissing them…I put them for the community. Today I finished Mary’s page, 25r. Yes, The virgin Mary. Tomorrow is the assumption of the virgin Mary. I plan to post the full translation tomorrow, barring any unforeseen circumstances. Oh, and if it is already assumption day where you are, cool…i still have some time to wait over here. Now, I kindly suggest you remember, if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything, and if you decide against that advice, you’d better be able to take what you dish out.
Dear all, I defense of “b”: She has contributed to Nick’s various sites for donkey’s years and has not only provoked useful commentary but provided helpful suggestions. I think Mindy might not be used to “full and frank” discussion and might mistake “b”s congential enthusiasm for a “short fuse”. We all start down cul d’ sacs only to have to retreat when damning evidence is laid out. I have myself on many occasions, most recently from my suggestion that a botanical’s leaves resembled mice, which were likely plague carriers until Sir H kindly informed me that this was a fact not known in the middle ages. I am not on the same page on “b”s transcription of the three lines of f116v but she is brave enough to put something forward with minimal coyness. Full speed ahead and let copyrights be damned!
Incidentally, I do find one slight problem with an Eastern origin (Asia minor, Crimea, Iran, etc.) for the VM and that is by the time of the 15th C, most manuscripts were using paper while Europe hung onto parchment (vellum) a bit longer. Still my VM flavor of the week is that the botanicals show an arabic influence. Diane, what say you? Likely you have been there and said that a decade ago??
Good evening all.
Okay, here is what I translated for folio 25r. My grammar in the language is still not great, so it is as close as I can get it, in English.
Woman queen you be, your heritage* be verified. Woman, oh your purity** was visible. “From me alone excellent king (INRE) came”*** Your good value (valuable) royal reign (was) fact. You, Mary****, your tomb is in Ephesus (with) John, woman, (you) remain. From our fair king, your son, your kin, the one John the great, you monk, a large quantity***** below (his) remains, fair woman, a large quantity your riches , golden beyond (eternity) beneath wealth.
(Signed by) wife of ( name reveals language of origin, omitted)
* heritage, this word could also be death. Then the sentence would read, woman queen you be, your death be verified.
** this is a word only used poetically, meaning pure. Since it is one of the few words with an anagram in it, it is possible it could mean something else.
***INRE, spelled with a lenient fh, is on the page, and translates as excellent king.
**** the word for Mary is spelled in a way to almost hide the vowel. There is a small chance it could also be a variant spelling of the word lord, but considering context that is not likely.
***** the term “a large quantity ” uses the exact same letters as roman, and is one of the few anagram words on the page. It makes more sense as a large quantity.
You know, a multilingual text isn’t impossible, even one encompassing the same geographic range as the Voynich imagery.
Just as example, a certain Ramon of Majorca (early and perhaps deliberately confused for Ramon Llull) wrote on a fifth quintessence, something he may have learned from the Indian system since
he knew, in addition to Hebrew, Latin, Spanish, Arabic, Persian, Turkish and Sanskrit.
Surprise you?
All we know is that
“he was a Jewish physician who lived in Spain (-ish Majorca) in the fourteenth or fifteenth century.
Cheers
My apologies, Mindy. I had no idea I was offending anyone. I was simply backing up your observation of that woman by referencing an historical manuscript illustration. I shall restrain from commenting on other persons posts from now on.
Meanwhile, friends, my latest visit to the Met struck “paydirt” (or treasure, Nick?) A quintet of ladies splashing each other in the bath. A female attendant observing the activity, and two people on a bench nearby (they may be playing musical instruments). The point I was trying to make is that the “nymphs” were “ghostly white” in a pool of black (tile?) water. The Met curator gives a brief commentary.
Dear Job, I extend apologies to you also. I admit I do get crotchety at times (I’ll be 70 y.o. on “Labor Day”). Caroline Finkel’s “Osman’s Dream” is a hefty tome to lift up to my one reading eye (six ounces, and very fine print).
Sincerely, beady-eyed wonder-r
Gentlefolk, this morning I made an on-line visit to Istanbul. I wanted to see Hurrem Sultan’s fabulous bath-house. Oh my! Wait until you see all of the circle motive!
beedee eyed wunder
Thomas,
when you say you have “one slight problem with an Eastern origin for the VMs”
Do you mean a problem with the material of which it is made or the matter which it conveys?
About the botanical folios, the issue isn’t one of nationality-as-language-group.
Some very good work has been done in recent years, untangling the various traditions and regions whose influence first affected the development of texts written in Arabic, and later which regions tended to produce imagery in a given style.
As far as I’m concerned, there is no particular meaning to the phrase ‘Arab manuscript’ unless it is one made in Arabia by an Arab tribe writing in Arabic.
Otherwise, whether in Arabic or not, it is Syrian, or North African, or Mughal Indian, or Spanish etc.
As far as works on paper are concerned – I shouldn’t be surprised to discover one day that some, at least, of the Vms text was gained from an earlier work produced on paper.
The botanical section looks to be to be rooted in Hellenistic sources, but stylistically what we now have shows influence from regions about the Great Sea. The closest match for some features occurs in a manuscript produced in Syria, by a Yemeni Christian, in Arabic, for a Turkish ruler. That manuscript was made at the same time I think the matter in the Vms made its way westwards – the century between the mid-12th and mid-13th. Looks as if some of what ended up copied to create the Vms (probably in 15thC northern Italy) had gone first into the Iberian peninsula, Majorca, Sicily or ‘somewhere southern’ (to use Panofsky’s phrase). I think the ‘nymph’ folios belong in that group.
Less sure about the route taken by the botanical folios. They could have gone directly to the Italian peninsula.
Umm.. have I answered one question or created a dozen more?
Nick & Diane, do you remember when I was departing from your blog page where I had commented on Ancyranum “ad infinitim” folio 116v-Voynich mss, and even discussed a couple of fiber-bearing animals famous in Ankara/Angora? Diane mentioned “a watery green thing…”. I vaguely remember referring to Suleiman’s preference for the color green and for a “watered camlet” (a wavy-patterned, felted garment, my comment) — (per page 50-51, Busbecque’s “Letters”). Yesterday I hauled home from our public library a huge tome (Thames and Hudson- Frayer and Stark :”Turkey”) Although the photography was
black and white and the subject matter was somewhat vague, I immediately recognized that image of the Black Sea, on a quiet day, from one shore to the opposite shore. Watery green thing indeed – thank you, Diane!
Diane, please DO tell us more about Ramon of Mallorca! Pretty please. I’ll even throw in a “thank you” with this request. Sincerely,
beady-eyed wonder
Make that Majorca. Every day, now, I do a series of memory exercises to check for impending Alzheimers. In many ways, Nick’s blog has been the best exercise for my brain. I mean to say that I frequently test my memory by going back into various of Nick’s other discussions.
ThomS, if you are reading this page, can you direct me to the page upon which I had a fit of hysteria in re Dioscoride’s un-illustrated first botanical manuscript (last night/early this morning). TIA (thanks in advance).
beedee
ThomS, I keep hitting the wrong key when trying to wind-up a post on this page. I’ll try to be brief: Would your mention of ani clay as a plague remedy be also a reference used by Busbecq’s doctor, who prescribed “lemnium earth” to be taken along with “scordium” ? (pages 69 and 138 of “Busbecq’s Turkish Letters)
Diane, do you recall our joint efforts several months (a year?) ago when Nick posted an item which we commented might be the drawings for Col. North’s turkish bath house/greenhouse? I still think that logo was a European adaptation of Nastaliq.
Nick, were you able to follow up on my leads to Greenwich University archives?
I’m trying NOT to be “making mischief” here but trying to “conclude” various “conclusions” I’ve drawn over time. Puns are sometimes the only way I can try to keep my comments non-controversial. I am still a huge fan (of yours, and trying not to “fan” the flames of controversy)!
Tricia, in response to your comment “Arcadia” huh?” : How about “one person’s (Suleiman’s) Arcadia can be “Hell” for a whole bunch of women who spent most of their captivity there. The closest I come to praying is the expression “There but for the grace of ……(Agape) …… go I” Twice in my life I’ve been homeless. Thirtty years later, I still send an “epharisto” card to the shelter with a cash donation.
Dear Job; in reply to your query in re 8g8g8g: “aes-geus-aes-keus-aes-geus” can possibly be a verbal, spoken “kowtow” — which is a bowing at the waist greeting to a “superior”. Please forgive me if I’ve been cynical or hurtful in my language.
Oh yes, another way the words “excuse-excuse-excuse” can be written in “Voynichese” is by simply using the smaller-size figure which looks like a smaller number “nine”:
9g9g9g — Try it out . Again, I apologize if my responses have overly curt or sarcastic.
Sincerely, beady-eyed-wonder (sometimes “wonderer”)
Dear Job, and any other interested in my post in re small 9 and large 9 — with or without the “8”: when those various “numbers” appear at random within a written group of letters, it means a single syllable or single alpha-character is being written. Some examples: small ‘9’ + ‘ \\) ‘ + ‘Pl’ equals the word “example”
In a recent note to Job I desperately tried to xplan that I have only ASCII key board, so I’ll try to clarify my use of the double slash mark-parentheses: handwrite, on a piece of lined paper, the following characters: make these short \\ and the let the parenthese ) become the upward stroke for the cipher letters ‘n’ and ‘m’ : word “america” : a \\) 9 a (insert a backward facing “S” which represents “r”, before the ‘9’.
a small numeral 9, which loop begins slightly under the line and forms the loopy “head” of the nine, and swoops downward and curves slightly to the left, and below the line of script. If you need any more understanding of why this particular “9” makes an “X”, Well, take an eraser and gently erase a tiny gap at the top of the loop.
Now is as good a time as any for me to explain that the larger “9” represents the sound of hard g and or k anywhere it appears in the manuscript. A symbol which looks very like these “9′ and actually is similar is the sound of ‘qu’ as in aqua. When you all can finally find the Boenicke 408 mss pages/folios which are first referring to AQUATIC plants and or referring to aquatic elements (nymphae), you will not recognize the fact that the scribes felt no need to fully write the word aqua — it was assumed to be read in context with whatever subject matter was being presented pictorially,
Oh, this long holiday weekend is interfering with healing of my collapsed lung (no recommendations for “therapy” yet, and can’t even make an appointment until Tuesday — which appointment may end up weeks down the scheduling clerk’s calendar). Oops, off-topic! Bye! (as she reluctantly goes back to playing “Spider, while breathing deeply in and out)……..mutter…..
Addendum to the “9” discussion: The particular character to which I refer as being similar to the larger “9”, but has a straight tail (and sometimes looks like the numeral 4) is the syllable “qu”.
You will find this symbol most often in the “botanicals” but sometimes in the various “balnealogical/waterworks” folios. This is because “qu” can appear in many discussions/words such as se-quence, a-quatic, e-qual, ……and can stand alone in such words as query, question, quality. It all depends on the context of whatever discussion is occuring, with or without illustrations.
Bdid1dr, did you consider the possibility that the sign 9 (EVA -y-) could be interpreted as a punctiation mark, i.c. comma ? The sign 9 occurs frequently at the beginning of a new sentence. De sign (,) seems te have been developed out of the sign (9).
Menno, in most cases where I’ve seen the larger figure ‘9’ appear at the beginning of a sentence it is basically “wrapping” the second part of a two-syllable word — and, because B-408 shows no obvious signs of punctuation in any of its folios, I can only illustrate (in English) thusly: “There is no ex——
cuse for bad nomenclature…”
I’ve only seen a few instances of another nomenclatural word ending. It is difficult for me to reproduce in ASCII script, but if you are still interested, take a look at B408’s folio 55v, and its very last word of the last six lines of text: oll-a-tius. That symbol can also represent “teus”
Folio 55v is the discussion of the aquatic plant known as the sacred bean of Egypt: the water LOTUS — not the water lily.
Even today, if you cruise the Web and Wiki and various other search engines, you will find much confusion between the water lilies (nymphae, f2v) and the water lotus (nelumbo, f55v). I can’t take up much more room on this, Nick’s, wonderful forum. So, I hope I’ve increased understanding of B-408’s offerings.
beady-eyed wonder
Nick, Diane, & ThomS: Earlier on this comment page, Mindy mentioned a woman with a hole in her stomach. I responded with a brief reference to the caesarian section’s earliest history. It just now dawned on me which B-408 folio was being discussed. At the time I was translating folio 116v, I had not paid much attention to the illustrations. So, now we have that illustration to back up my discussion of the “rest of the story”. That woman was Julius Caesar’s mother. Her son Julius adopted/fostered Augustus. Augustus conquered Ancyra/Ankora/Angora. B-408, folio 116v is simply discussing the Monumentum Ancyranum -Res divi Augustus.
“Busbecque;s Letters” tells of Busbecque adding to his coin collection from that monument site.
What I’ve also recently discovered is that Busbecq wrote/dictated his memoir quite a few years after his return to the European courts of Ferdinand and Rudolph. I’m still pretty sure that B-408 was his personal diary of his travels through Ottoman territories. His diary may have been left behind in either Ferdinand’s court or Rudolph II’s court. It most likely ended up in the Roman College/Gregorian University archives as “spoils of war”. According to various stories of how and when Mr. Voynich bought that manuscript from the nearly-derelict Jesuit archive (in the early 1900’s ad) we’ve been speculating ever since.
ThomS, I’ll re-phrase a question I posed several days/weeks ago: Is there possibly a relation between “lemnium earth” (in Busbecq’s writings) and your terminology “ani clay”? I see a strong coincidence because those two terms are both discussing remedies for serious illnesses/plague. Busbecq also refers to a “weed” which he called “scordium” which his companion physician (Quacquelben)used for symptoms of “plague”.
Stephen: Just so you know — ThomS is one of my favorite people. Not that I’m laying claim to him or ennything like that.
ThomS — cheers!
beady-eyed wonder
🙂
Dear Mindy & friends: I’m still trying to catch up with y’all. I now can see where Mindy perceived my comments as being snide. So, I shall try to “mellow out” and use a more gentle tone. Mindy, your discussion of the young men and “darkness” and other somewhat ominous overtones to your translation may be referring to the use of the mandrake ROOTS which were burned to make a very powerful smoky anesthetic on the battlefields when it came time to amputate the wounded soldiers’ limbs. Have you found any discussion in re various opiates? I haven’t, so far. Also, so far, I haven’t found a drawing of the opium poppy and/or its seedpod. One of the most recognizable features of that botanical specimen is what botanists call a “tiller” leaf stem. Still looking, but as beady-eyed and wondering as ever.
I have an idea; let’s turn Vms research into a game.
Imagine everyone in a circle. You pass your theory in its unfinished state to the person on the right, whose job it is to spend the next month trying to prove that you are correct. At the end of that month, you receive ‘your’ body of evidence back, and pass it to the person on the left, whose job for the next month is to put that evidence to the test(s) – historical, statistical etc. as appropriate.
The aim is (i) to increase objectivity (ii) to increase critical thinking and (iii) to decrease the egotism which seems inseparable from thinking of an arbitrary notion as *MY* theory (which I will defend against all evidence, reason and commonsense).
anyone think *MY* proposal a good one?
Naturally, at the end of each two months, the order of persons would have to be randomised before the next distribution.
Bdid1dr
Just noticed your saying:
“Busbecque;s Letters” tells of Busbecque adding to his coin collection from that monument site.
Have you any information – documentary, pictorial, or other – about his coin collection?
Because if you haven’t, I should tell you that it took me three months continuous work one long vac to do the research which resulted in identifying about a quarter of the relevant figures.
I already had some years of experience to draw on, and the university’s resources. Honestly – demonstrating such connections requires a lot of time, and is worthless unless you have already enough to be sure that you’re searching in relevant times and places and know exactly what distinguishes different styles in art for distinguishing e.g. a celestial from a terrestrial sheep (not to mention identifying breeds).
Trackless waste for newcomers – I say this kindly.
Trackless waste, eh? How about “down the garden paths” and into “boxwood maze”? I thought you might pick up the conversation with my mention of coins. Perhaps you have already gone down the path which Caroline Finkel discusses in her book “Osman’s Dream” pages 6 and 7? Elsewhere in her book, she discusses Catherine the Great (and medals)?
Bd1dr
I mean that imagery used on coins had such symbolic value (pardon the pun) that interpreting it correctly needs a substantial knowledge of historical context – not only for a given image, but its antecdents. Sometimes an image is simply copies because a traditional or ‘antique’ form – other times because the beliefs informing the image have been retained or regained too.
I’ve already written a bit on the topic, and include a paragraph or two in the posts outlining the Vms imagery’s major chronological strata. There I refer to a medallion made for one of the d’Este family.
And since I see no compelling reason to imagine the Vms made much later than c.1438, and its imagery is explicable within that as upper limit, I’ve had no reason to refer to anything so late as the sixteenth century, let alone the eighteenth. 🙂
Dear All,
I have been unavailable for awhile, and have not had time to translate much or even visit this page much. I have conducted only two new pages of research, which is very low for my usual pace. I have passed the method on to some people who are now working with me to continue the transcription translations. I have also contacted a few native speakers, and am awaiting reply as to whether or not they can validate my results.
BDID1DR, thank you for your comments. I have not seen reference to opiates yet. I have seen reference to a “golden drink” on a few pages. And of course there is the likely cannabis page (I have not translated this page yet). I am currently working on a page which looks like it deals with a golden cup with two forms, one of which is a woman, and the other perhaps a son (king).
Also, I may be moving shortly (job and location). If so, it is unknown how much time I will have to spend on the Voynich manuscript. It is possible I will have some time which is away from my family. While the potential of leaving my family doesn’t make my heart happy, it may mean I have more time to devote to the manuscript. (This will actually depend on the amount of free time I will be able to find while I am at my new job.)
Also, at present, I have found several supporting manuscripts in various locations throughout Europe which provide supportive data for the Voynich Manuscript. Of course, the bulk of these reside in the country of origin, but there are a number of other interesting manuscripts out there which are also helpful. One example is the Tacuinum Sanitatis.
The interesting thing about the Tacuinum Sanitatus is the method of plant depiction. Rather than exact copies of plant style, one can see the artist’s intentional exaggeration of key parts of plants for identification. An easy example is the Tacuinum Sanitatus’ Mullberry bush. When examining the mulberry bush in this book, one notes the “round” leaves, with bumps protruding from them. When looking up an actual mulberry bush, it can be seen the leaves themselves are generally round (or maybe tear shaped) and ridged. (Note, I have not currently ascribed the mulberry bush to any Voynich pages…but I have used the mulberry bush as an example to show how during the Middle Ages, plants are often intentional artistic depictions, rather than exact replicas.)
Also, one woman a while back (Judy?) asked the question of whether or not the Voynich Manuscript could be/reference multiple books. Considering there are multiple authors, and multiple stories from multiple countries, not to mention the multiple page numbering systems in the manuscript, I would actually support this as a valid possibility.
Also, I have found a current text book which taught me more about the language, and validated the time period of the writing to the time period I have ascribed (generally 300-800 AD, although some stories occur historically much earlier, and at least one occurs as late as probably the 12th century).
Finally, I am curious…does anyone have a better copy of page 95R? The first part of the page is folded over the first letters of each line. I am writing to Yale to see if I can get a better copy (email not sent yet). However, if someone else has already done that, please let me know.
Mindy,
Without preempting your plans for publication, can you explin what gave you your dates:
… the time period I have ascribed (generally 300-800 AD, although some stories occur historically much earlier, and at least one occurs as late as probably the 12th century …
Is it the script, or the vocabulary used, or internal allusions to e.g. historical events?
D
Mindy & Diane: I have translated the Mulberry Bush/Tree depicted on B-408, folio 11v. It is not the tree itself that is being portrayed but rather its fruit, a berry. Nowhere in
B-408, f-11v is there any label for that fruit; only discussion of the tree’s leaves being “pabulumox” for sericinae (larva of the Chinese silkworm moth). The discussion ends with reference to “blattae” (moth eaten). That reference is a cautionary note to unwind the cocoon before the moth eats its way through the cocoon and destroys the continuity of the thread (silk).
I have offered this same discussion before on other of Nick’s pages.
Diane,
Yes, but I will have to make it brief. I just tried to type up a long response, and accidentally deleted it before posting. Boo tablet usage. Anyway, there are several reasons:
1) culture of origin flourished during this time period.
2) writing style of language
3) identification of letters by melding bc and ad letter systems
4) number of recounted stories in the book ascribed to this time period
5) identification of authors and subsequent dating of those authors historically placing them in the time period aforementioned.
I am trying to also use imagery to date the book, but so far most images post date the book, one of the main exceptions being de medica materia. None the less, these imagery related books
are often useful for identification.
Mindy,
Did you know that it was a tradition among pre- (and post-) Portuguese mariners of the east to have on board a story-teller, whose tales combined elements of geography, history, fabulae, meteorology, natural history, religion and astronomy? The genre is found again in a consciously literary form in the ‘market-place tales’ informing the Alf Layla wa Layla, in which we find a first refemce to cards – as aids to memory of things learned.
Mindy & Diane: I refer you to Busbecque’s Fourth Letter, wherein he discusses the city and country of Cathay (China). Several paragraphs later, he discusses “the art of printing has been in use among them for many centuries past, as is proved by the printed books existing in the country. They use paper prepared from the cocoons of silkworms, so thin that it can be printed on one side only, the other side being left blank.”
So, I refer you once again, to B-408 f-11v, which the illustration is a mulberry fruit. The discussion is all about “sericinae” products. “Sericine” is the latin word for “China” and products of “Chinese” industry.
Italy and France eventually developed huge factories of their own for producing silk fabrics. The factories basically enslaved their own citizens/populations for the production of that fabulous fabric.
Diane,
I did not know that. Fascinating! It makes sense why they would want to bring a story teller, because all good myths have elements of truth in them.
BDID1DR,
I finally found some time to look into who ogier busbecque is, and I think i can see why you are drawn to him. I personally like the line from one of his teachers referring to learning about God through the teachings of Seneca. I have not seen anything about busbecque thus far, but he would be a good candidate for someone who might have been entrusted with the knowledge in the book.
Nick, in particular, and Diane: Have either of you followed up on my leads to Professor Caroline Finkel (University of London) and her hugely informative tome “Osman’s Dream”, The History of the Ottoman Empire”. Surely, one of you is qualified to approach her? Or maybe the University of London would be within Nick’s reach for researching their archives?
I’m referring to an earlier discussion on this page where, once again the radiocarbon dating of the Vms seems to be erroneous. Do I not recall correctly that the final test results put the age of the vellum as being the 1470’s plus or minus 20-something years? If so, I compare the time and place of Seigneur (Charles V gave him that title) Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq’s birth, and the possibility that he had access to his father’s manuscript stores to take with him to his various schools/universities, and onward with him to his diplomatic endeavors.
I’m hoping that *some* of our current-day European/Australian/New Zealander professors of history who are currently posting to Nick’s Voynich-related topics will take the time to compare my offerings with the history that they learned — and subsequently have passed, verbatim, to this century/millenium’s discussion of a very old manuscript.
I’m still on the trail of some of our current-day writers of history, whose paths cross with the offerings of Boenicke 408. One writer who wrote a fictional account of current-day Israel’s archaeology (“The Source”), is still being re-printed in “Large Type”: James A. Michener.
Correction to my latest post: Ogier Ghiselin was the “natural” son (meaning out-of-wedlock, my definition) of George Ghiselin II, Seigneur de Busbecq. Ogier was legitimized by Charles V in 1549.
For a fascinating read, with much dialogue and references/similarities to our mystery manuscript, one can’t go wrong by buying the paperback translation of Edward Seymour Forster (Amazon.com is a good source).
Tricia & Mindy (In particular): I refer you to my commentary of April 30, 2013 on Nick’s page “That which brings your website to its knees”: I translated on that discussion page, seveal lines of text which discusses the origins of the sweet-smelling, crowded together “Dianthus” flowers (carnations/pinks/sweet williams). Their origin is also indicated by the “Ceos species of the flowers as “Dianthus caryophyllacae”. References are also made to “the Caria district-SW Asia Minor”
The second set of 11 lines are much more “ominous” as far as references are being made to “Laconian maids in temple to Diana: Caryatides, Cariae. The dialogue gets “dark”, and appears to be discussing “prison”, “incarceration”, “captivity”, “shriveling”, “wrong”.
Besides this discussion here on this page, I hope you’ll go back to my earlier post and see for yourselves. What is most confusing about this folio is that I translated from a black and white photostatic copy from John H. Tiltman’s attempt to decode Boenicke 408 folio 56r. Only after I finished the translation did I download a full-color copy of the manuscript page: The flowers were colored blue! I still stick by my translation of the folio’s content — and the ominous, unhappy tone; white slavery to work in temples dedicated to Diana.
Furthermore, I’ve also translated the group of Boenicke folios which segue into discussions of “Diana Nemorensis”, “Artemis”, Lakes, and Sacred Groves.
On various other pages of Nick’s discussions, I’ve cross-referred various botanical items with the “Recipe” and “Pharmaceutical” discussions.
So, “here and there”, amongst the lengthy Professorial discussions which invariably follow nearly all of my posts, I sincerely hope you will be able to look at your own decoding efforts from a “fresh” point of view. Somewhere, not too long ago, someone referred to my “bandwagon”. I vehemently reiterate, herein, I have no desire for a bandwagon, nor to pull a bandwagon. That is hard work, for which I greatly admire our host Nick!
beady-eyed wonder
I’d like to re-phrase a comment I made on this page in re Busbecq’s commentary on Boenicke 408’s last folio 116 (v?r?)
I am still positive that the writing thereon (that last folio, only) was Busbecq’s. Because he reportedly returned to Europe with some 240 antique manuscripts which he gifted to his boss Ferdinand I. He may have chosen this particularly “shabby” manuscript upon which to hand over the entire collection (of some 240 manuscripts) to Ferdinand. Some of Ferdinand’s collections may have ended up in Rudolph’s court subsequent to Ferdinand sending Busbecque and the menagerie, post-haste to Rudolph/Mattias’ Bohemian/Prague court. Sometimes “provenance” remains obscure because of intervening disturbances of disease, famine, warfare, natural disasters (earthquake/floods……).
Kircher’s “Ars Magna Sciendi” (a short ref in Godwin’s biography: “…his most difficult. being an elaboration of the art of Ramon Lull, the thirteenth century Majorcan philosopher, into a kind of symbolic logic.”
my brief, excerpted, reference is directed to Diane’s attention and her previous posts in re Ramon Lull — and that beautiful manuscript to which she referred. 🙂
Bdid1dr,
I would be interested to read your full analysis and translation of the VMS somewhere, rather than a continuous series of snapshots, which are spoiling this informative blog of Nick Pelling.
Menno Knul
Menno, considering that the entirety of Boenicke manuscript 408 is presented as a series of snapshots (here on Nick’s blog, and on Yale’s Boenicke Library offerings, 5cents’ blog, Rene Z’s blog, Elmar V’s blog, Rich S’Coloma’s blog…..) and I have not been able to find the publisher of that huge book that Nick’s friends in Venice/Milan displayed — page dimensions appeared to be about 20 by 32 inches — ? If it is not Nick’s intention to pose puzzles to the W W W, where do we all answer him? I’m not sure that he would appreciate all of us sending replies to his email.
So, I am now w-ndering about Nick’s intentions by posting “a vis- map of vnich ev theor…… or any of his musings.
Bdid1dr,
Please do not hide yourself behind the back of others, but open your own blog or website to all interesting parties. Please stop spoiling this informative blog with lots of non-information.
Menno
Menno
I have faith in Nick to do the moderating on his own blog.
Nick, I’ll be visiting your “all about” and “nymph small” pages shortly. Meanwhile, have you had a chance to view the “Nizami Nymphs” in their black-tile swimming pool? (courtesy of the “Met”)
I should like to read again the observations made by ….. who formed the view that the Voynich text was not so much written as drawn.
If any grand old elephant minds would deign to recall and inform, I’d be much obliged.
Diane, may your query be related to some discussion where Nick mentions some wax tablets being used to enable scribal efforts to encrypt certain ciphers? Or sumthin’ like that?
Maybe I’m not yet qualified as a “grand old elephant”?
beady-eyed won-der 🙂
I admit that my “elephant-like” memory seems to be getting more vague with these passing months. So, I now rely on google to keep track of my daily wanderings/ponderings. 😉
Stephen Bax, Sorry to have missed your post of Sept13. I was under the weather for a bit and writing later on the McCrone analysis but the gist of any remarks I might have made on Arabic influences on the VM plant drawings comes mainly from the book by Minta Collins on Illustrative Traditions of Medieval Herbals in which she discusses imagery and graphic traditions of Greek, Arabic and European herbals. In brief, the Arabic artists were much less concerned with what we would call reality (like leaf veining, 3D depictions, light and shadow) but more with decoration and pattern (sometimes almost rug like). No leaf veining is seen in most that I have looked at and which is true of the VM. Leaves and Blossoms tend to be idealized. No blemishes. Where the VM has brown leaves, these (I think) indicate that fresh or dried leaves are useful for some medical use. Plants seem to be drawn perpenicular to the bottom edge of the page and not coming into the frame from the left margin as true of some Greek herbals. The herbalist who really created the genre of herbs as medicine is Dioscorides with his Materia Medica, in five volumes. These were not illustrated but others stepped in and provided these, among whom were many artists from places like Spain and Alzaera that included Baghdad. Anyway, beg borrow or buy a copy of Collins. Then you will know as much as you need to about arabic herbals. Cheers and again, sorry for the tardiness. Tom
Menno, I would point out that bd has been an habitue of Nick’s VM sites for years and often her asides prove useful to others. I benefited from one discussion of hers on the mastic tree, found chiefly on the Greek island of Chios and investigated by Dioscorides. Some may find her to stray off the main topic under consideration but that is her style. Please refrain from giving rudeness a bad name. Cheers, Tom
Thomas,
IF the content of the Vms’ botanical pictures was known; IF its pictures were certainly from Europe’s herbal tradition, and IF the text were discovered to be from Dioscorides’ writings, THEN most of what is said about the Vms botanical folios would be justified.
Baresch thought the matter not Caucasian-European-monotheist; Panofsky too; so did Wiart and Mazar. Stolfi thought the text non-European. I came to similar conclusions while investigating the manuscript’s imagery.
Even the few pigments McCrone were permitted to analyse contradict the medieval Caucasian-Christian-European driver hypothesis.
The manuscript’s including a substance like wax crayon, or that substance McCrone calls “optically consistent with copper resinate” plainly argues against a provenance in fifteenth century Latin scriptoria. To then take the position that it proves the pigments must be ‘later accretions’ is one conclusion; to read it as yet more evidence for non-European provenance is another.
That McCrone *could not identify the resin* used in that substance tends to suggest that chronology is not the issue; it’s location.
The largely unrecognised assumption on which most Vms hypotheses stand is that a manuscript ‘of importance’ on parchment must be associated with important or superior men.
Thomas, your moving across the Bosphorus, not nominating an ‘author’ and considering non-medicinal uses for plants without being ignored, diminished or denigrated is a very positive sign in Voynich studies. More power to your arm.
Bdi1dr
Thanks for the response. I thinking rather of someone who pointed out that the written part of the text looks as if were ‘drawings of letters’ – something of that sort. My search engine seems to be highly economical, or protective. Hopeless for anything pre-2011
Stephen Bax, I realize now you were also curious about Armenian herbals or maybe Armenian herbal literature. The best way of getting into this area is simply to “google” Stella Verdanyan who is a Russian Armenian with expertise in early Armenian medicine. An early Armenian herbalist is Amirdovlat Amasiastsi, born in Amasia in what is now Turkey and wrote three herbals (unillustrated) in the 15thC. It is true that Armenian medics were at the cutting edge of the day in performing surgeries, particularly of the eye (Amasiastsi is appointed chief occulist to Ahmed II, the Ottoman conquerer of Istanbul, in whose court Amasiastsi served. It is not true that Armenian medics were the first to perform autopsies and that dissections were forbidden by the RC church. A papal bull forbidding the cutting up of slain crusaders for easier transport back to Europe was taken to mean that autopsies were off limits to Christians, of whom Armenians were among the first and most zealous. The apostolic church of the Armenians did not recognize the primacy of the “bishop of Rome” as their own archbishops predated the hierarchy of the Roman church. They were early dissectors but so were medics from northern Italy.
Anyway, Armenian medics shook up a lot of the convenional medical beliefs of the day with their own ideas on fevers and diseases caused by moulds. The early herbals of Heriatsi and Amasiasti are unillustrated but later versions copied from them were illustrated and Verdanyan has provided a few typical illustrations from a 16thC herbal held in the library of Yerevan.
I think many of the weird leaf shapes of the VM “herbal” reflect organs of the body, like eyes, bladder, uterus or the male member but I have a lot of convincing of the readership to do on this point and the link to Armenians is plausible but only conjectural. Cheers, Tom
Diane, Thanks for the “thumbs up” but it has to be admitted that many Latin glyphs (a,c,o,m.n) occur in the VM as well as some classical Tironian notes (like “)” as sort of a superscript). I think some Tironian notes are made to resemble Armenian glyphs like the backward “S” (c with a backward “c” superscript) and the tipped “2” but many are either ancient and rare as a T.N. (like the inverted Greek gamma) or unique to the VM scribes (like the “8” like glyph with a rocker at the base). I think there is some Latin influence and am just guessing, for the moment, at Latin influences on the scribes at one of the far-flung Genoese or Venetian outposts in the Mediterranean. Cheers, Tom
Dear all, Now for my own venture into what some might think of as “down the rabbit hole”. I propose that the original botanical coloration used in the VM is derived from plants not minerals and that is why most of the resulting colors were fugative. I think vegetable dyes were used, sometimes as mixtures. Green was always tricky for early dyers and rug makers and they frequently relied upon a mixture of indigo and a yellow dye derived from larkspur (Delphinium sulpureum) or weld Reseda luteola). I think that in a few spots in the VM botanical section we can spot an indigo residue under the later green overpainting with a mineral based pigment (see f22r, 42r, 49r). Yellow has flown as it has totally gone in the flowers of f65r I will write more extensively on this point but 1) use of vegetable dyes on vellum was ancient and 2) the McCrone Assoc. results on the three colors they analyze are not original coloration, are irrelevant and largely useless to our interest in the time line for the creation of the VM botanical section.
If this idea is correct, i.e. the original coloration of the VM herbal section was done with vegetable dyes, then one might get some clue as to the venue where THE ORIGINAL COLORS WERE APPLIED. It could coincide with textile dying but particularly rug making and might include Persia, many of the “stans” and India.
This simple hypothesis could explain a lot of really homely coloration that remains in the VM botanical depictions, like some grey-blue of f13r and 96r. Incidentally the black used in dying also corresponds closely to the composition of the iron gall inks.The ink analysis is the only part of the McCrone work that I think we will find useful. I am bracing for shouts of outrage but how else can we explain the need to repaint nearly everything in the VM botanicals?
For a breif rundown on vegetable rug dyes see Jacobsenrugs. Cheers, Tom
Dear all, Are scattered examples of original colors, on which my argument of 12/4 depends, something that is still problematical? If original color (that appears to me to be either inks, water colors or washes) can be demonstrated, could we not agree that it is analysis of these pigments that should be given priority? I don’t think it is “eyes over seventy (mine)” that is a problem but sometimes the original colors may appear very faint and some might logically have assumed them just to be variations in the hue or intensity of the only painting that was done on a botanical illustration?
Thomas,
Of course you’re right; it would be helpful if we could have a scientific evaluation of the pigments as we have for the inks, but the television company or people linked to them were interested in having specific pigments, on specific places on specific folios tested, and hired McCrone to do those tests.
The results may be less helpful than they might have been if McCrone had been given a more prominent role at the planning stage, but tv documentay-makers are entitled to their own agenda which in this case produced relatively little of value for us. Relatively little – but not entirely uninteresting.
If another person or company is some day willing to pay for them, lets hope McCrone is left free to design the tests, which I’m sure they’d do by the book.